NO

ROOM
FOR
A
WALLFLOWER

A Lancer Supplement Miguel Lopez Tom Parkinson Morgan Massif Press, 2019


NO ROOM
FOR A
WALLFLOWER

For LANCER, Prerelease Draft

By Miguel Lopez and Tom Parkinson Morgan

Massif Press, 2019

([email protected])

 “These are the days of lasers in the jungle, lasers

in the jungle somewhere.”

Paul Simon, “The Boy In The Bubble”

*



“What are we coming to

No room for me, no fun for you
I think about the world to come
Where the books were found by the Golden Ones
Written in pain, written in awe
By a puzzled man who questioned
What we were here for
All the strangers came today
And it looks as though they’re here to stay.”

David Bowie, “Oh! You Pretty Things”

Hello, GM. Some notes for you below on this most recent iteration of the draft version of No
Room For a Wallflower:

● The module that follows below does not set out a 100% fully written campaign for you
to follow: rather, it is meant to be read as a broad outline for a narrative to be given life
and further color by you, the GM. Think of this text as a 50/50 split: 50% pre-written
narrative, 50% for you to fill with encounters, characters, and more specific dialog.

● For the purposes of keeping sane, assume all times and measurements (unless
specifically noted otherwise) are consistent with an Earth-standard day and Earth-
standard measurements. Feel free to devise your own system of time measurement for
Hercynia, if you’d like!

● Dialogue and description do not need to be read 1:1. They’re intended as guidelines, as
are NPC and place names. If you want to make a change, go for it!

● The players’ characters are referred to as “players”, “PCs”, or “Protagonists” in the text.
Non-player characters are referred to as “NPCs”.

● This draft of No Room For a Wallflower is mostly complete, however, you’ll notice that
NPC stat blocks are missing, as are specific profiles for certain enemies (and types).
We’ve got those proofing in the lab right now — rest assured, when the full release
comes out, we’ll have those specific blocs, types, and profiles entered. In the
meantime, we’ll note in the missing entries some suggested stat blocks to use.

● No Room For a Wallflower features story moments called Beats. A Beat indicates a
moment in time that marks a “before” and an “after” in the lives of the players and
NPCs — we don’t define the specific when of a story beat (other than the season in
which they occur), but once they pass there’s no going back. Players don’t necessarily
need to be present at every single beat for them to occur, but their presence will greatly
affect its outcome — so too will their absence.

Core Missions and Faction Motivation

Factions now have core missions and institutional motivations — that is, specific objectives
and broad interests that the faction as a whole seeks to accomplish, not necessarily reflected in
the individual desires of distinct persons who are members of or party to a given faction. There
are two kinds of institutional motivations: negotiable desires and non-negotiable desires, as
well as an institutional north star, their Core Mission.

Negotiable desires are those that a faction is willing to lose ground on to accomplish. They are
important, but not critical to the success of a faction’s core mission. Negotiation around these
kinds of desires might be simple, or they might be exhausting — it all depends on your
narrative’s context — but the point remains: a faction is, ultimately, willing to sacrifice a
negotiable desire in order to achieve success in its overall mission.

i
Non-negotiable desires are those institutional desires, objectives, persons, or goals that a
faction is not willing to sacrifice in order to achieve their ultimate goal on Hercynia. These can
be “managed” without the consent of the faction — often through combat, coercion of key
faction members, or the effective employment of other hard/soft powers — but on a level playing
field a faction will not budge on their non-negotiable desires.

A faction’s Core Mission is the faction’s animating purpose behind their campaign on Hercynia.
Generally, a given faction’s Core Mission falls into many different categories: securing
infrastructure to produce social and financial capital, or defending itself or its allies from
elimination, or seeking revenge for past wrongs, or bringing peace to a world scarred by war,
and so on. Each faction will have their Core Mission listed in their entry: all actions undertaken
by the faction should, generally speaking, be oriented around advancing the faction towards the
ultimate success of their Core Mission.

!ii
Timeline of Events

Winter 5014u

Beat: Ground Party

Beat: Evergreen, Down The Well

Evergreen, After the Flood

Beat: Home Downrange

Patience

Evergreen, Points of Interest

Daily Life

Points of Interest: Detailed

Beyond The Walls of Evergreen

Spring, 5014u

GM’s Eyes Only: Encounter Scheduling

The Bottom of The Well

Beat: Casting A Wide Net

Beat: Home On The Range

Beat: Downstream

Beat: Elevator — Going Up?

Beat: Patience, Echoes, and Ghosts

Beat: Somewhere, Beyond The Sea

Beat: End Of The Beginning Of The Line

GM’s Eyes Only: Overview of Act II

Right Where We Left You

Life In The Green Zone

Patience, After the Flood

Early Summer, 5014u

Beat: Elevator, Going Up, II

Beat: Home, Downrange

Beat: Sniper Kill Team, Redux

Beat: Underground, As Light Fades

Hivehome and the Royal Hive Tunnels

Hivehome: Detail, Surroundings, and Points of Interest

Hivehome: Introductions

Late Summer, 5014u

Beat: A Stain You Can’t Wash Out

Beat: Last Call in Egregor Cross

Beat: Mountainfall

Beat: Tumbledown

Beat: A Bridge To Sell

Fall, 5014u

Beat: Relay Choir

Beat: No Room For A Wallflower

Low Orbit, above Hercynia

!iii
Counterattack

Beat: Cold Emerald Tomb

Numbers and Officers

In The Meantime…

Aftermath, Recovery, and What Is To Come

Winter, 5014u

Available Beats

Beat: Dustoff (Winter 5014u)

Beat: Open Comms I (Winter, 5014u)

Closing

Spring, 5015u

Available Beats

Beat: A New Dawn (Spring 5015u)

Beat: Open Comms II (Spring 5015u)

Beat: Wild Growth I (Spring 5015u)

Closing

Summer, 5015u

Available Beats

Beat: A Long Patrol I (Summer 5015u)

Closing

Fall, 5015u

Available Beats

Wild Growth II (Fall 5015u)

A Long Patrol II (Fall 5015u)

Closing

Winter, 5015u

Available Beats

Wild Growth III (Winter 5015u)

Closing

Beat: The Return of Comfort (Winter 5015u)

Closing

Spring, 5016u

Available Beats

Beat: A Long Patrol III (Spring 5016u)

Closing

Summer, 5016u

Open Communications

Available Beats

Beat: Operation Calling Card (Summer 5016u+)

Beat: Solitude (Late Summer 5016u)

Closing

Fall, 5016u

Beat: For All Time (Fall, 5016u)

!iv
Closing

Beat: The Mouth of Eternity (Fall, 5016u)

[closing?]

Winter, 5016u

Beat: The Stone-Star Map (Winter, 5016u)

[≠closing]

Beat: For All Time, Again (Winter, 5016u)

[closing!]

Beat: The End (Winter, 5016u)

Closing

Coda

GM Tools:

Downtime, Tables, and Stat Blocks

Downtime In Evergreen

Get A Damn Drink

Build Camaraderie

Use Offworld Comms

Tinker, Tune, or Puzzle Out

Training, Consultation

Romance

Navigate Bureaucracy

Minor Attack

Minor Attack

Major Attacks, Battles, and the Battle Tracker

Major Attacks

Battles, the Battle Track, and Pivotal Moments

Battle Sizes

Non Player Characters:

Enemies and Allies

Hercynians

Rangers

Hercynian Chassis

Hive Guardian

Primary

New Doctrine Egregorian

Egregorian, Main Phase

The New Doctrine

The New Doctrine: Anthrophile

The New Doctrine: Empath

The New Doctrine: Exomorph

The New Doctrine: Memorial

The New Doctrine: Juvenile

Landmark Colonial

!v
Colonial Militia

Colonial Subalterns

Landmark CRT Member - Dismounted

Landmark CRT Member - Mounted

Landmark CRT Corvette

The Machine

OVERLAND Penitent Swarm

KINGWATCHER Uplifted Subaltern Squad

Corrupted Agricultural Drones

Cascading O/K Clone

Hemorrhage Chassis

Hollow Chassis, Aspect of The King

Hollow Chassis, Orbital

Beggar One

Mendicant Two

Hierophant Three

Wonder Four

Faction Summaries

Hercynia (Union Name)

Evergreen

Union Patrol UTC-CL-05 “Ceremony”

OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER - Core Subjectivity

The Deadlands

The Machine: The New Choir

Mendicant Two

Hierophant Three

Wonder Four

Solitude

Laguna

St. Tellus, Bem Honore, and Bella Costa

St. Tellus

Bem Honore

Bella Costa

Hercynian United Cities - Survivors of the Hercynian United Cities and Evergreen

The Marches - The Wandering Hordes of Beggar One/Patience

Landmark Colonial

Constellar Midnight Team Perfect Execution

Landmark Colonial Relief Force Weatherglass-Torricelli (LCRF-WT)

The CELESTINE Project

!vi
 Timeline of Events
4500u - Hercynia settled. Contact and integration efforts begin.

4505u - Contact team killed by hostile native forces and the “Hercynian Crisis” begins.

4525u - U/MEF Overland arrives at Hercynia at the beginning of the year.

U/MEF Kingwatcher arrives at the end of the year.

4528u - Overland and Kingwatcher dig in after TBK authorization in designated green zone.
TBK engaged.

Second Committee overthrown during the Revolution of ‘28.

Egregorian anti-air/anti-orbital grounds tens of thousands of Union personnel on Hercynia,

preventing retreat; TBK halted before total-complete.

4530u - Hercynian Quarantine declared.

Survivors on Hercynia settle cleared Egregorian hives across the world.

Unable to assist stranded personnel, in-system NHP designate a 300x200km “landing” strip on
Hercynia for debris to guide and crash down; allows for safer settlement of the world and
reliable salvage location. Semi-permanent communities form around the strip, the largest of
which is the Scuttle.

Elsewhere, Union personnel move in and occupy previously cleared Overmind hives.

4538 - Third Committee takes formal power on Cradle, begins consolidation.

Hercynian quarantine remains in effect; local NHP mothballed by exiting 2ndComm personnel.

Tin Hat Kings encounter Egregorian scavenger parties in the Scuttle; tracking the survivors back
to their burrows, they discover and capture Solitude, a living juvenile Overmind.

4550 - The First Revelation of St. Tellus sends breakaway group out to found eponymous city,
St. Tellus.

Lagunan community encountered by proto-United Cities explorers. Work begins on Lagunan

high road and waystation towns.

4670u - Coastal community Bella Costa incorporates. Trade with Laguna formalized; Ferry
across Lagunan straight established, as well as the first of the straight’s lighthouses.

!vii
Hercynian United Cities formally recognized by delegates from Hivehome and Daylight.

4814u - Endeavour, another living Overmind, and their brood discovered under Hivehome.
Hercynian-Egregorian relationship begins.

The last Tin Hat King overthrown by own Royal Army; Scuttle renamed Bem Honore; caudillo
system replaced with democratic council. Informal “Three Sisters” diplomatic arc established.

High road between Laguna and United Cities completed.

Hierophant Three arrives in Bem Honore.

Mendicant Two arrives in St. Tellus.

4860 - Contact established between the United Cities and the Three Sisters. Trade relationship
established.

4950u - The Machine — Beggar One — makes landfall at Laguna.

Metastatic period begins. HUC1 isolated under massive, planetwide commsat jamming.

4954u - The Machine stopped at Egregore Cross. Remission period begins.

4960u - Union quarantine lifted, colony charter lottery2 assigns world to Landmark Colonial.

4963u - Hercynia settled by Landmark Colonial. Evergreen established.

Quiet_Night established.

4970 - Informal “Three Sisters” relationship collapses as St. Tellus and Bem Honore form the
Bicameral. Lead by Mendicant Two (and associated lieutenants), the Bicam assaults and
annexes Bella Costa.

5013u - The Machine resumes war posture, assailing Egregore Cross. Outlying communities of
Evergreen report increase in disappearances, dead livestock, and anomalous radiation
signatures.

Late 5013u sees the first attacks on Evergreen proper.

5014u - In early 5014u, official request for assistance issued from Hercynia. Nearby civilian ship
Comfort diverted to assist3.


1 HUC: Hercynian United Cities

2 Now-defunct system. Charters granted this way are ensured on a case-by-case basis since the lottery system’s
retirement. Hercynia’s case is under special review.

3 Beginning of No Room For a Wallflower, Act I

!viii
5015u - The Machine’s local commander, Beggar One, defeated following deployment of
ANVIL-pattern “Flathead” RKKV.

Evergreen reports total settlement loss, incl. loss of core administrative subjectivity (LNDK-
PATIENCE variant of the common SIDEWALK-J2 municipal NHP) and territorial integrity: Broad-
band request for assistance issued.

The Comfort begins slowdown burn on return to Hercynia

5016u - Narrative Present

ix
Act I: Hercynia, In Bloom
Winter 5014u
Beat: Ground Party
The players are members of a party of mech pilots bound for Evergreen, a recent colonial
settlement of roughly 15,000 souls on the planet Hercynia, a colony world in the Coreward
Spin, a colonial expansion zone in the 4th ring of Union space. Evergreen nears its 50th year as
an established colony. It is stable, growing, with another 200,000 embryos in storage.

Evergreen’s parent company, Landmark Colonial, has requested peacekeeping intervention

on behalf of the colony after a well-armed group of unknown origin attacked Evergreen’s
satellite buildings, targeting power plants and other resource generation sites. Tracks and
weapon scarring are consistent with at least one chassis and a number of powered infantry, far
more than the local militia can handle.

No Room For a Wallflower begins in the winter of 5014u — two years before the narrative
present outlined in the Lancer Core Book. The players’ affiliation could be with any group,
state, or organization, though we recommend establishing them as members of a stakeholding
entity. Some examples follow:

Union Auxiliary, Peacekeepers

On patrol through the Coreward Line, the players are members of a UA Peacekeeper group
deployed and on patrol. Usually a boring, safe assignment, peacekeeping patrol sees small
teams of Union-flagged forces of a local polity billeted aboard freighters or colonial supply
ships as they traverse the system. These teams are meant to be flexible, to respond to distress
calls encountered in-flight, or to follow up on previously flagged calls for aid. This team — the
player characters — are responding to a previously flagged call for aid. Union Auxiliary forces
are outfitted via local and galactic outfitters, and there is wide room for personalization.

Union Auxiliaries are, legally, members of the Union Navy, and there is a military chain of
command above them. As Auxiliaries, they are most likely members of a local polity’s military,
but have been integrated into the Union Navy command structure for the term of a
deployment. Their commanding officers report to Union officials now, and any fallout of their
conduct will be subject to Union rewards and/or punishments.

As members of a Union Auxiliary Peacekeeping force, your rules of engagement (ROE)

prohibits firing first until a clear hostile force has been identified. They would also urge de-
escalation, preservation of life, seeking peaceful resolutions to conflict without bias towards
either sides, and accurate data collection.

This might be the first time that the players have ever heard of Union.

1
A Union Auxiliary unit on a peacekeeping tour represents an external party, one Landmark
might be hostile or unreceptive towards.

Landmark Colonial Crisis Response Team

Landmark Colonial runs its own crisis response teams, or CRTs, that are tasked with running
surgical, physical asset-focused ID and retrieval missions. CRTs are made up of small, multi-
role fighters from a myriad of professional backgrounds, typically soldiers and law
enforcement officers. CRTs are outfitted through Landmark’s armory, which has fleet contracts
with IPS-N, SSC, and GMS, though Landmark’s corporate charter and fleet contracts have
negotiated room for some small personal items. Using HORUS and HA gear on a Landmark
mission is generally frowned upon by the higher ups, and depending on who your CO is you
might catch a note in your Landmark dossier.

CRT members are Landmark personnel, and are subject first to Landmark’s internal discipline.
Landmark fiercely defends its CRT personnel, and will cover for them so long as their mission
is deemed a success by the higher ups: CRT mission debriefings are rarely shown to persons
outside Landmark’s management. A CRT’s commanding structure generally involves two
people: their offsite commanding officer, patched in through the CRT’s companion/concierge
unit, and a legal consultant who acts as that CO’s executive officer (XO).

As members of a Landmark CRT, the players would have strict rules of engagement: secure
the colony’s NHP casket, secure essential personnel and equipment, and ensure accurate
data collection. All other costs and casualties can be recouped; unless you implicate
management or disobey their orders, your actions planetside will most likely be considered
justified.

As members of a Landmark CRT, you have most likely heard of Union.

A Landmark CRT represents an internal party, one Landmark would grant special permissions
and access.

Mirrorsmoke Mercenary Corporation

The Garbagemen of the Galaxy always scrape up the worst jobs, but look, it’s a damn job, and
it only takes a couple under your belt before you’re back on your feet — or, more accurate for
this crew — up on your feet for the first time. MSMC is a big, active mercenary corporation,
with a wide portfolio of services covered at the lowest sustainable bid. Some go lower, but at
that point you’re buying corpses: MSMC might come with a few deadbeats, but it’s gonna get
the job done and done final, or your money back.

2
As members of an MSMC detachment, your characters come from a wide range of
backgrounds and training, from disgraced operators, to purchased inmates looking for
redemption, to refugees looking to establish citizenship, to individuals down on their luck and
in need of a new start. You may have a suite of your own licenses, or you may need to lean on
MSMC’s contracts with GMS and IPS-N to get by. As members of an MSMC detachment,
your old identity has been wiped from the record, and replaced by your callsign: you are under
the command of MSMC’s officers, career mercenaries who have signed on for additional tours
with The Company. An MSMC detachment generally has a CO and an XO, along with their
own ship.

MSMC detachment contractors have a mixed ROE, one external and one internal. Your
external ROE are, essentially, public relations goals: don’t harm or assault civilians, don’t
destroy property, and get a favorable review from your employer — in this case, Landmark
Colonial. Internal rules of engagement might align with your external ones, though there is a
bit more of an understanding between your employer and your CO. Sometimes civvies get
hurt, and sometimes the property you were supposed to protect might wind up damaged or
destroyed. But hey, you completed your objectives, right? Not too many of you got smoked?
Mark it a success, all’s well that ends well.

Disciplinary action for breaking an ROE might be something from as quiet as a name change
and rotation, if you’re in good enough graces with MSMC’s higher-ups, or it may be as
consequential as being wanted by Union’s Department of Justice and Human Rights.

MSMC contractors, by and large, have heard of Union; indeed, many of them have really
heard of Union, and might be technically on the run or otherwise persona non grata in Union
territory.

An MSMC detachment is an example of a 3rd party element, a wildcard team: likely hired by
an individual or organization, they play the grey area between sanctioned and unsanctioned
agents, and might similarly tread the grey area between “good” and “bad”.

3
Beat: Evergreen, Down The Well
The deck rumbles beneath your feet, and for the first time you hear the howl of windshear as
the shuttle breaches Hercynia’s thick atmosphere.

The world below, seen through the a thick, condensation-streaked porthole: An emerald smear,
scarred by ragged patches of black and brown. Patches of grey cloud cover speak to the
months-long rainstorms that plague Hercynia.

“Thirty minutes out.” The shuttle pilot’s voice in your ear, shaking from the turbulence. “Leave
your helms on for now, cabin’s not pressurized. And we’re going through a helluva lot of chop.”

His radio squawks off. The cabin lights flicker from an especially hard knock, and the wind shear
dies down, the howling engines settle to a level cruising roar. The hiss of air through your
helmet subsumes all other sounds.

Below, emerald Hercynia.

Below — somewhere below — the mildewed halls of ancient Egregorian hives lie dormant.
Waiting. Empty.

The shuttle is a bare-bones civilian shuttle, hired on contract from the Comfort, a civilian
freighter on a long-flight supply run through this colonial expanse — the player’s home since
they were tapped to respond to Evergreen’s distress call. Two rows of fold-down crash seats
facing each other across a wide cargo bay stocked with bundled supplies. The cabin is not
pressurized.

There is a ramp at the rear end, and a sliding door on either flank. The pilot and co-pilot are in
their cockpit, separated from the players by a locked door. Portholes line the flanks of the
shuttle, to let the players see out.

The players have a duffle with what gear and equipment loaded into that they could fit. They’re
wearing light, loner EVA gear if their personal equipment isn’t environmentally sealed.

The shuttle is a pass-through. It will drop the players off, refuel, perform a flight check, and
take off the next day.

4
The rear door of the shuttle drops, and the humid Hercynian air rolls in, wet and warm.

The shuttle’s engines are winding down, buffeting the tall grass that surrounds the landing pad.

A light, warm rain falls. Evergreen sits a mile away, backed up on the banks of an unnamed river.

A small team of armed colonial militia approaches the shuttle, weapons slung, holding on to the
brim of their hoods against the downdraft. There are only ten of them, spaced in a ragged line,
staying low as they can while still standing.

“You the pilots?” One of the militia shouts. Their leader, judging by her kit: a thin armature
exoskeleton, powered by a blocky pack from which a tall spray of antenna emerge. She carries
a long rifle, anti-armor, and is followed by a nervous aide.

“Afternoon,” the militia commander replies. “I’m Brava Hadura, commander of the militia here.
Glad you’ve finally arrived. Listen, we shouldn’t be outside the walls too long — there’s a sniper
in the area.

“The Egregorians are back. I’ve seen them myself, seen their beasts lurking in the dark. They’ve
infested the whole world again.” Commander Hadura looks around the waving grass, leery,
hunched over her long rifle. “We need to get inside, quick. Come with me,” she says, turning on
her heel before you can reply.

The rest of the militia follow, splashing through the culverts that run on either side of the damp
earthen road.

It is a cloudy, miserable day. A mile down the road, a light haze of smoke and cookfires drift up
from Evergreen. All around you, tall grass waves, buffeted by the idling shuttle engines. A light
rain falls, and there is a chill in the air.

5
Brava Hadura, Militia Commander
Brava Hadura is the commander of the militia as appointed by Patience. Prior to the appearance
of the Hercynians, she acted as sheriff of Evergreen, calming arguments and ferrying drunks to
their homes. She’s long been a popular fixture of Evergreen: the colony has no jail, and in her
capacity as sheriff, Hadura was well-respected conflict manager trained in interpersonal de-
escalation and crisis management. She did not carry a weapon — none of Evergreen’s police
did — until the attacks began.

Evergreen, despite its current siege posture, was a colony commissioned to be a “soviet”
settlement — a humble workers’ world, tasked with harvesting and exporting fine Hercynian
woods and organic materials. With such an emphasis placed on community, the people of
Evergreen have displayed nothing but love and solidarity to Brava through the course of her
transition; Hadura has returned that care in her work, refusing to carry a weapon or incarcerate
community members during her tenure as sheriff. Now, however, the repeated Hercynian
attacks has her rattled, shaken by the loss of her troopers and dramatic change in her
professional responsibilities.

The militia killed by the Hercynian raiders are her neighbors, her barber, the guy who ran the
corner bakery, the woman who used to sell tea prior to her call-up — none of them are career
soldiers. They’ve had to learn fast the dangers of combat.

Some of Brava’s troopers are on heavy cocktails of adrenal-boost/psycho-suppressants, a

steady drip of chemicals designed to boost their combat performance and suppress their fear;
these are meant for short-term use, but as the raids have dragged on, so too has the militia’s
reliance on them. Brava has not adopted their use just yet, but even so she and her troopers are
running a bit ragged at the edges.

Brava means well, cares deeply for her home, her young child and partner, and her parents. Her
first loyalty (beyond to her family) is to the people of Evergreen, and she may be stubborn in her
defense of them. She carries a standard militia kit while on duty: body armor, a rifle with
sufficient ammunition, and associated gear.

6
Evergreen, After the Flood
Evergreen is a colony city of 15,000 people and growing, one edge bordered by a wide, slow-
moving river. Homesteaders make up another 2-3,000 persons. Of these homesteads, Liu
Maize and Merricktown are notable for their size and organization. Loosely policed by
Evergreen’s militia, Liu Maize and Merricktown are farm towns that trade in agricultural goods
with Evergreen’s merchants, though the legality of this (from Landmark’s point of view) is fuzzy.

Evergreen itself is more built up than its population needs: they are building for the future,
staking out land and constructing domiciles for future generations. This pre-building has lead to
whole blocks of the city being empty, built up but sealed and waiting for future occupants. These
blocks are mostly four to five story tall apartment blocks, fit to house around a hundred families
each. They mostly occupy the Southwestern and Southeastern quadrants of the city: the rest of
Evergreen’s population lives in the Northwest and east, upriver from the new construction.

The early winter rains have flooded large swathes of the city. The heaviest flooding is in the
Southwest quadrant of Evergreen: the water generally is at a uniform waist height, thick with
debris and fallen trees, uprooted bushes, and natural waste. The river’s current is slow and
swollen, not particularly dangerous, but it is cold and cluttered. Districts of Evergreen that border
the flood zones are blocked off by high sandbag and mud barricades, with a couple of
unoccupied blocks given over to the flood.

The east side of Evergreen is the landward side: a low prefab wall rings the current boundaries
of the city; beyond, the clearcut, expanding every day as massive drone cutters and their
handlers chew up old growth. The area closest to Evergreen’s walls are crowded with a ramble
of tents, natural-wood buildings, and people, a refugee city home to hundreds of cold, hungry
homesteaders frightened by the ongoing raids.

The refugees are petitioning Patience, the city’s NHP administrator, to allow them to move into
Evergreen’s unoccupied blocks, but Patience has maintained a strict stance: homesteaders
broke Landmark’s charter agreement by leaving Evergreen, thus Landmark doesn’t need to look
after them. Negotiations are ongoing.

Evergreen is nominally under siege, but there are no armies encamped outside of the city walls:
occasional attacks disrupt the normal function of the town, and Patience has adopted an
emergency powers posture, but the only visible encampment is the refugee camp.

7
Beat: Home Downrange
Commander Hadura leads the way into the city, waving away the IF/F drones that buzz towards
you as you approach the town’s walls across the clearcut.

“We’ll get your particulars entered in our database,” Commander Hadura says, motioning
towards the departing drones. “That way you can come and go and you won’t trigger the guns
or drones.” Hadura pauses. “Or the mines. We’re looking to plant them soon. Sonic, messes
with the Eggs’ heads, we think.”

The militia lead you into the muddy, churned streets of Evergreen, tromping on the perforated
metal slats laid down to provide some stability to the ground. There is little traffic to impede
your progress; what people there are scurry from overhang to overhang, crouched over their
bundles of goods to keep them dry.

Evergreen is a squat, low city building itself into its future. Grimy prefab buildings crowd the
colony’s mud-spattered blocks. Gutters burst with water. Power lines criss cross above the
street in thick bundles, some hanging like black vines. Rain barrels have long since overflowed
and spilled into the streets.

You approach an intersection where a militiaman waits, pressed to the wall of a two-story
apartment building. The first floor looks to be shops — wares offering local breads and other
foodstuffs, judging by the signs painted on the closed metal grates — below a flat or two, their
windows also shuttered.
...
“Careful,” the lone militiaman says in a whisper. “That sniper was just firing down the street. No
clue where he is now.”
…
“From the woods, that way.” The militiaman points in the direction of the forest beyond the wall.
“If you gotta cross,” the militiaman says, “go fast.”

There’s a small chance that the sniper is watching. Up to you whether or not they decide to
shoot — if you’d like, this can trigger a Minor Attack, a tool available in the GM toolkit section.
Otherwise:

You cross without incident. The rain continues to fall. The Governor’s Farm is just up ahead:
another walled complex, built of local stone and what looks to be salvaged starship plating.

8
The gate appears unguarded, and grinds open as you approach. A few scattered subalterns
patrol the courtyard, their dull metal bodies beading with rainfall. They bear the planted-flag
logo of Landmark Colonial and are painted in Landmark’s pale orange and blue livery.

*
Patience
Patience, the town’s mayor, appears to the PCs as a being of light. Built pixel-by-pixel by blue
pips of light, coalescing into the shape of a bored-looking administrative professional,
heavyset, wearing a wrinkled though otherwise nice suit. They are an administrative NHP, a
LNDK-PATIENCE variant of the common SIDEWALK-J2 municipal NHP. Until relationships
change, they will treat the players as citizens and do its best to ensure the safety and smooth
operation of Evergreen — even if that should run counter to the players’ needs.

Patience is kind, though firm. They’ll allow the players to download a map of Evergreen and
surrounding environs, including the location of important landmarks like the colony’s
Omninode, power plant, print shop, and so on. They will grant the players the ability to pass
through all areas of the city as they want, but reserves the right to limit their use of the printer,
as it is their only one and their omninet connection is slow: others need to use the printer and/
or the omninet, and just because they’re pilots doesn’t mean they get to rule the resources of
town.

Patience has given the players rooms at the Bottom of the Well.

The PCs printer access begins just after they finish talking to Patience. At this point, they can
start printing their chassis.

Patience on the Egregorian threat:

“The attacks began a month ago. A homestead, six miles upriver from Evergreen:
my drones registered small arms fire in the pre-dawn. By the time our militia was
able to reach the homestead, the Egregorians had already slaughtered the families
there. The homestead was burnt to the ground and their food stores smashed,
burnt. It would appear the Egregorians, if that is what they truly are, wished only to
sow destruction and terror.” Patience, the lightform at least, sighed. It spun a pen
on its desk. “They shot them as they fled, and left the bodies for us to find.”

“I presume it is the Egregorians. Historical records note that, towards the end of the
Crisis, Egregorian Overminds had bred and taught their drones and warriors to
interface with our systems. They could wield our weapons, could craft crude native
variants. Their adaptability was remarkable, as a virus’ strain can mutate to adapt to
its host.”

9
 On the history of Hercynia:
“The Hercynian Crisis was a regrettable period in human history, but Landmark
Colonial had not yet been incorporated. As such, we bear no culpability for the
action that took place here, nor do we endorse the elimination of self-aware
species. However, the Egregorian species showed no willingness to entreat with
Union representatives, and their response to first contact prompted a response of
equal measure. We at Landmark Colonial are looking to move forward, not dwell in
the past, and view Evergreen here as a hopeful sign of progress.

On tracking the raiders:

“My auxiliaries have identified tracks consistent with mechanized cavalry, armored
infantry, and subaltern bipeds. Scoring is consistent with energy weapons. I
recommend requisitioning enhanced energy shielding.”

On its motivation:
“What do I fear? I fear death for my people. I fear total colony collapse. I fear a
failure of my mission.”

On the history of Evergreen:

“Evergreen? I chose the name, it seemed fitting to the world. I was the first seed
planted here after the Crisis; Landmark purchased the rights to develop this world
from Union’s Colonial Development Bureau fifty years ago and has prosecuted their
contract aggressively. Our colonial birth schedule is one of the fastest in this sector.
Already, there are two more Patience-Clones en route to Hercynia: Landmark has
identified two more sites to establish viable colonies.

“We have never encountered an organized, technologically advanced threat;

immunization protocols prevent my people from falling ill, and the walls have been
sufficient to negate any predators. My eyes only extend so far from the wall, and I
must confess I have seen nothing.”

10
Evergreen, Points of Interest
● The stable reactor power plant, built downriver, outside of town. Salvaged from the
colony ship that brought the first generation of colonists to Hercynia, this reactor core
can power the town for millennia. Should it be attacked and breached, however, the
result could be catastrophic not only for Evergreen, but for the planet at large.

● The Governor’s Farm is the administrative heart of Evergreen. Built in the center of
town, the Governor’s Farm houses not only Patience’s physical architecture, but the
council hall, the town’s municipal data storage, the militia’s armory, and the cold gene
storage.

○ Council Hall: the meeting hall for Evergreen’s town council.

○ Municipal Data Storage: the eponymous “Governor’s Farm”, the hardened

server racks that host the town’s data.

○ The Militia Armory: holds the militia’s anti-personnel and anti-armor weapons
behind lock and key. The town can supply enough militia to form two squads of
militia.

○ Cold Gene Storage: holds hundreds of thousands of fertilized embryos at stable

subzero temperatures. When new colonists are needed, they’re picked from
here and raised in surrogates.

○ Patience. The NHP’s physical architecture — its “casket” — is housed in a

secured underground complex below the Farm.

■ Patience has an offworld backup site, a bare-bones facility built into one
of Hercynia’s moons: Quiet_Night.

● The Bottom Of The Well, the town’s only bar. Serves locally brewed beer and distilled
spirits. Has a small limited printer that can fabricate facsimiles of any brew in the known
galaxy, though the taste might be off a little.

● The Print Shop: Located in the walled inner compound that is the Governor’s Farm.

○ When the players arrive in Evergreen, the printer is a Schedule 1 printer, which
means it can print objects, systems, vehicles, weapons, and other items up to
Size 1.

○ Upgrading this printer can be done by broadening Evergreen’s omninet

coverage to allow for transmission of a Schedule 2 printer pattern — a blueprint
that must be built — convincing Patience of its necessity, or simply telling the
players that a second shuttle is on the way with the requisite parts.

○ If you’d prefer, Evergreen can begin with a Schedule 2 or 3 printer.

● Omninode: Located some distance outside of town, atop a high point in Evergreen’s
valley wall. The world’s only omninode, this communication device connects Evergreen
to the omninet. Should the omninode go down, the players would have no way of
printing newly licensed mechs, supplies, gear, etc, or contacting anyone or thing
offworld. Radio broadcasts are possible, but due to the vast distances involved in
interstellar travel, radio waves reaching anything would take at minimum some few
hundred years.

● The Slow River: a wide, muddy river that Evergreen backs up against. There is a
footbridge across it, and farmland on the underdeveloped side. The colony is in the
process of building a larger permanent bridge across the river.

11
Daily Life
Life in Evergreen has been mundane for the last 50 years of the colony’s existence. Patience
dictates what your role is based off of a combination of genetic predisposition and aptitude,
places you accordingly, and assigns you your daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly tasks
consummate with your experience and desired goals. For most colonists, this means one of
three things: you produce, you engineer, or you facilitate.

Producer-tagged colonists fall into farming, crafting, resource extraction, harvesting,

manufacturing, fabrication, and other artisan roles. They tend to be the ones growing,
harvesting, and/or preparing foodstuffs, biofuel, raw materials, consumable goods, etc. Your
farmers, brewers, clothiers, carpenters, loggers, miners, ranchers, general workers, etc, fall in
this category. All-rounders, skilled laborers, meant to ensure that the colony has a wide base of
talent and resources to draw from.

Engineer-tagged colonists adopt industrial, scientific, or other roles requiring deeper, specific
instruction. An Engineer-tagged colonist might be an electrical or mechanical engineer, a
subaltern tech, a printmaster, a meteorologist, an omninet specialist, a nuclear engineer, a
drone pilot, a doctor or medical technician, etc. Specialists, meant to ensure the colony’s
systems are as efficient and reliable as possible.

Finally, facilitator-tagged colonists fill a fluid, interpersonal category. They are teachers,
foremen, operations managers, city planners, coders, bureaucrats, assistants, therapists —
people who work to ensure the smooth functioning of the colony, health of its people, and plan
for its growth.

The militia is made of up a ⅓ sample of each group, with the remaining slots filled by subaltern
units.

Daily life in Evergreen is goal-driven and worked in shifts, AM and PM. Most production and
construction occurs during the day shifts, maintenance and quieter production/construction jobs
are done during the PM shifts.

Patience is, essentially, omnipresent. Each colonist domicile has a companion/concierge unit as
the center of their home, a personal assistant that keeps their calendars and schedules,
reminders, contacts, etc. Most colonists have fabricated a personal hand-unit as well — a “slate”
— a common, hand-carried, portable, omninet-connected computer, camera, game system, and
communication device used throughout the galaxy.

Patience listens, collects, and collates all data in its central storage unit below the Governor’s
Farm; the relationship is one way, as the concierge units can feed information back to Patience,
but colonists typically cannot access high-level data from Patience without clearance granted by
their job portfolios.

12
Evergreen operates on a hundred-year plan: in one hundred years, they will be at capacity —
200,000 persons — and ready to transition from an NHP-administered settlement to a total-
organic leadership. In the meantime, Patience runs the show, with interpersonal conflicts
handled by a Settler’s Council.

There is no official currency in Evergreen; the settlers all work towards the common goal of
ensuring Evergreen’s survival. Patience administers colonists’ license data and apportions out
print time. Colonists improve their requisition ability through instruction, learning, achieving day/
week/month/year goals, enjoying the privileges of birthdays and other holidays, and so on. For
dealing with the unsanctioned homesteads — specifically, Merricktown and Liu Maize —
colonists barter goods and services.

Evergreen has five festivals: Settlement Day (celebrating the colony’s foundation), New Year’s
Day, Heart of Winter (festive dinner at the heart of winter), Summer’s Dawn (usually a field day
at the beginning of winter), and Landmark Day (mandatory celebration of the foundation of
Landmark Colonial).

Points of Interest: Detailed

The Bottom of The Well

The one and only bar and tavern inside Evergreen. A squat, wide, three story building with an
attached, enclosed patio area. Set against the river with handmade docks extending out into the
shallows.

The whole first floor of the Bottom is a bar, meetinghouse, and performance space. One wall
opens out onto the docks and can be buttoned up in the cold.

The second and third floors are apartments, some vacant and waiting for their assigned
colonists. These are where the players are able to stay.

The roof is a patio space as well. Laundry is commonly air-dried up there during the summer.

Inside the bar is a community bulletin board: notices and requests are commonly posted (with
clearance and priority determined by Patience).

The Print Shop

The print shop is in the warehouse district of Evergreen, a fenced off area near the Governor’s
Farm. Protected by a unit of Landmark Subalterns directly controlled by Patience and (now) by
a squad of Evergreen Militia, the printer is the production heart of the colony.

Most of the warehouses are full of prepackaged, pre-made materials, offloaded from the colony
ship upon arrival. These are under lock and key. A host of drone swarms patrol the warehouse
district, with hive nexuses located atop each warehouse.

13
The printer is able to print up to Size 1 objects to start with. They being said, there are a number
of ways to increase printer capacity:
● Concluding Beat: Casting A Wide Net (Summer, 5014u).
● Reference the Power At A Cost tool in the GM section of the core rulebook to determine
other ways of finagling a printer upgrade.
● Establishing a timetable upon introduction: Perhaps the players escorted the parts for a
Schedule 2 printer to Evergreen on their shuttle, or maybe another shuttle is on the way,
due in a few short months.
● Or, if you would prefer, Evergreen may begin with a Schedule 2 printer.

The printer stands three stories tall and is fully enclosed. A command tower sits adjacent to the
printer, and a catwalk rings the entire structure. The gasses and waste product of the printing
process are vented high above the printer, most captured and recycled before they can pollute
the atmosphere.

Printers cannot print other printers or fabrication devices, a blanket prohibition by Union on any
public plans for fabrication devices. Datatagging, Omninet monitoring, and layered security
protocols prevent this, as do harsh punishments for people who attempt to break the prohibition.
Printers are obtained from licensed companies and shipped whole, with no maintenance
information given to the owners or access panels to working parts, or as a single-use burnout
code that allows a colony NHP to build one, and then forget the plans.

The Governor’s Farm

Evergreen’s administrative heart. Evergreen’s Patience clone resides here, its casket buried fifty
feet beneath the earth. Accessing Patience’s casket is restricted to Landmark personnel of a
given rank, or those who can spoof those credentials (this would take a check, no automatic
success without some serious mitigating circumstances).

Also stored underground, though accessible by those with the correct medical licensing and
credentials, is the colony’s seed bank. Both plant seeds and fertilized embryos, kept in sub-zero
conditions. The plant seeds are meant for slow introduction; the genetic material is meant to be
implanted every nine months. Should there be no viable host, the genetic material is crèche-
grown and extracted, though Patience tries to avoid this as much as possible in order to avoid
creating unnecessary socio-cultural divisions.

The Farm itself is a big compound, a square of low-profile buildings built around a central,
paved plaza. The administrative work of the colony is done here.

14
Beyond The Walls of Evergreen
Hercynia is a forest world, crowded with old growth since regrown after the Hercynian Crisis
some 500 years prior to the events of this module.

It is an old world inhabited by the young. The planet’s biome experienced, essentially, an
artificial extinction event, and has slowly been healing since the end of the biome’s death. 500
years is a long time on a human scale, but on the scale of worlds it is not nearly enough for a
species to step in and fill the sudden gaps. As such — as a world — Hercynia is eerie, quiet,
and largely empty of large fauna — though some remain. Insects abound.

Around Evergreen, the climate trends towards tropical, with uncanny harsh winters that bring
snow and ice. The colony sits in at the floor of a wide, wooded valley. The rolling land is broken
by sudden buttes, evidence of the planet’s ancient glacial past. To the colony’s east and west,
the valley walls rise up to alpine heights. A distant mountain range marks the northern horizon
— no more than a low bruise across the horizon. Clouds spill down from the valley’s western
slopes, soaking the plains in steady, warm rain.

Union practiced a re-seeing program a few hundred years prior to Evergreen’s settlement. While
none of the large terrestrial mammals managed to take root, localized birds and fish are a
common enough sight. Cranes stalk the reedy shallows of the river near Evergreen, picking at
the localized trout and salmon runs. The mornings are often filled by the sound of distant,
solitary birdsong.

In the lands around Evergreen, some colonists have made their homes on lonely tracts of
cultivated farmland. The soil, tortured as it was five hundred years ago, is rich enough now to
sustain life. Waving regiments of tall corn butt up against native trees, their stalks supported by
legume vines and modest, localized gourds. Rice paddies march along the river upstream from
Evergreen, siphoning the cool water out from the wide current.

It is rare, but not unheard of for colonists ranging far from Evergreen to encounter the rusted,
decaying remains of an old Union ship or mech, forgotten after the resolution of the conflict.
They have been told to flag the wreckage and avoid the area, as there might be some old
munitions, still live and dangerous.

Further still lie the unranged lands, areas of dense growth as-yet unexplored by the young
colonists. Bands of Hercynia have been imaged by passing ships, but these are standard-
definition still images of the world, lacking data other than visual, and incomplete anyways.
Should the players seek to range out this far, they would have to pack survival gear, and would
most likely be asked by Patience to send data back to the colony and plant Omninet towers as
they go.

Distant to the North, the land stretches for thousands and thousands of miles, forest eventually
giving way to a borean tundra beyond a massive mountain range. Part the product of the natural
rain shadow and part the result of an initial glassing campaign by Union, this tundra is foul and
inhospitable. These are the Deadlands, and not much is known of them.

15
To the East, the continent runs out into a grey and turbulent straight dividing Evergreen’s
continent from an as-yet unexplored and un-imaged Eastern Continent.

To the South, the forest runs and runs, giving way to ocean much like the Eastern boundary.
This ocean is more temperate, even tropical, dotted with islands in archipelago all the way to the
South Pole.

To the West, forest runs for thousands of kilometers until ocean, split by riverlands and plains,
karst topography flattened by ancient glaciers. There are scattered wrecks of ships that crash-
landed on Hercynia, and the remains of aboveground Egregorian tower-hives. Across the
ocean are more temperate lands, as-yet unexplored by the new colonists.

16
Spring, 5014u
GM’s Eyes Only: Encounter Scheduling
Hercynia is a world alive with life and activity: when Union pulled back at the end of the Crisis,
they did so in a hurry, and tens of thousands of humans were left behind. Now, five hundred
years later, the survivor communities have grown into civilizations. These are the Hercynians.
The communities local to Evergreen’s immediate territory are members of a coalition of
Hercynian city states — the Hercynian United Cities. The group that the players encounter is a
small long patrol, a raiding party sent to scout for them.

If the players choose to strike out into the woods, they would likely encounter small and
medium size alien wildlife. Refer to the Core Rulebook for stat blocks.

While the Hercynian United Cities have their own goals and motivations, an element of their
command probes Evergreen’s defenses, attempting to discover why the Machine 4 is so
interested in taking the colony. The short answer, they discover, is that Evergreen has a printer,
an NHP, and omninet access. In a miscalculation, the United Cities’ high command decides it is
more expedient to eliminate the colony’s printer, reactor, and omninode in order to deny the
Machine its objectives.

Within A Week

The Hercynians will raid the area outside of Evergreen once more, testing the town’s defenses
now that the players have arrived. This should be a small, rapid attack, with the Hercynians
prioritizing chaos, information gathering, and retreating — they won’t fight to the death, they’d
rather run.

For the first encounter with the Hercynians, if in the woods:

You see them first as misshapen silhouettes in the dim arboreal light: rounded upper
bodies, long antennae, thin limbs, moving fast and low between the trees. Whoops
and cries echo out from the dense forest, high keening calls over the low rumble of
heavier units that thunder behind.

Egregorians. The hive. The world alive with them.

The first shots crack through branches, setting them alight with sudden terrible
heat, and the air is filled with the thick smell of smoke and ozone. A second sound:
the drone-buzz of lasers.

4 More on this later in the text.

17
 If in Evergreen:

The rain drifts in waves through the empty, muddy streets, pooling in trembling
puddles. The town, modest though it was before the alarm went off, feels deserted.

No, not deserted. Too quiet. Something is coming. The rain falling over the river
creates a haze of mist, muffling all sound.

A shape rounds the corner, low, hunched over a long, thin weapon. Emerald-black,
slick with rain, the size of a man, maybe larger — Egregorian. It lopes across the
street, followed by its fellows, a whole clutch of them, all armed. Chittering back
and forth, they approach a shuttered apartment complex, weapons trained on the
windows.

Within Two Weeks

The Hercynians will make an attempt on the reactor in a night raid, aiming to disable it. The
attack will begin with infantry, but as it grinds on, mechs will show.

Within Three Weeks

The Hercynians will make a push for Evergreen’s omninode. This attack is a significant
escalation — it appears that taking down the omninode is of utmost importance for the
Hercynians.

Before Early Summer, 5014u

Assuming the Hercynains do not accomplish any of their objectives, the United Cities’ high
command determines they must pull back and defend their own territory; the colony has
proven too hard to take, and the Machine’s armies are coming closer.

The Hercynian rangers deployed around Evergreen start to pull back, leaving a small
contingent of rangers behind to manage the logistics of retreat back underground and to wait
for any stragglers.

The players can track the Hercynians to their base of operations: an old Egregorian hive
mouth, a number of kilometers away from town. See Beat: The End of The Beginning of The
Line for detail.

18
The Bottom of The Well
At the Bottom of The Well, there are a number of side missions the players can embark on
(These side quests can also be prompted by Patience; the only necessary part of these
missions are that OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER gets introduced)

A flickering bulletin board hung on one wall of the Well, a bright landscape frame with a plain-
text display behind a scratched plexiglass screen. One corner of the screen displayed the
weather, a live-radar picture of nothing but green. The rest held steady, two short notices that
called your attention:

“FLAGGED:” the first one reads. “AREA EAST OF LIU MAIZE… NORTH OF RIVER… AND
UP.... OFF LIMITS (PATIENCE’S ORDERS) DUE TO REPORTS OF HOSTILE ACTORS.
LEVEL 3 EVACUATIONS: GO!” (see Beat: Home On The Range)

The second is less grim:

“FLAGGED: OMNINET BOOST? LABORERS/SECURITY REQUIRED, CC ALL RESPONSES

TO CHIEF ENGINEER CASTOR FIELDING.” (see Beat: Casting A Wide Net)

Beat: Casting A Wide Net

Hey, hey you’re those pilots, right? You got a moment? I got an idea for how to help the whole
colony out…
*
Chief Engineer Castor Fielding comes to the pilots with a proposition: they’ve fabricated three
omninet towers and need help posting them atop the buttes that ring Evergreen. It should be
easy enough to mount them and get them online, and once they are it’ll get the local omninet
boosted out far enough to reach even the most distant homesteader.

Of course, it’s not that easy. The first two towers go up without a challenge, but soon enough,
any sensors the players carry should be able to pick up Hercynian signatures. An attack is
imminent, approaching their position as they work to set up the third tower. They’re going to
need to defend it from raiders, then (assuming they are successful) launch a counterattack on a
detected column of raiders heading towards the other two towers.

If they stop the initial and secondary attacks, the towers are safe, and the omninet spreads out
over the horizon.

This unlocks the ability for Evergreen to request a Schedule 2 or 3 printer, which Union will most
likely grant them.

This side quest also prompts Home On The Range, if the players have not yet completed it.

19
 Castor Fielding, Chief Engineer
Castor is an old man, having arrived in the first wave of colonists fifty years ago.
Working with a small team of other engineers and subalterns, Castor helped to clear
brush and drive the first pillars into the Hercynian earth. The walls? He built them.
The Governor’s Farm? He lead the team that built it. Now, at the age of eighty, he’s
starting to slow down a bit. He trains the new corps of engineers and stays sharp by
supervising city and environmental engineering projects.

Castor is ambitious, protective of his buildings, and works strictly in hard copy. He
keeps his plans in a fireproof safe in his third floor apartment in the heart of town.
His burgeoning engineering corps’ big immediate goals are twofold: to expand
omninet coverage and to complete the river bridge.

Beat: Home On The Range

The land on the undeveloped side of the river is given over to farmland and paddies: this
agrarian spread runs for miles inland, broken by dikes and soggy fences splitting fields of maize
into manageable acreage. The edge of cultivated land butts right up against the forest. New
arrivals to the fields are often told not to linger there.

There are a number of small homesteads and farmhouses that dot the land outside of
Evergreen, lonely outposts where farmers, ranchers, and other land managers make their
homes. Built on low, stilted platforms, these homesteads are meant to withstand the occasional
flooding. There is an ongoing project to build up the dikes running along the river to better
control the winter flooding.

Most of the farmers have evacuated from the countryside, but some still linger. A call comes in
to the militia, requesting help. A family is looking to evacuate, but their subalterns aren’t letting
them leave their home and won’t respond to commands from them or their in-house comp/con.

*
Hello? Is anybody there? This is Albert Liu, out at the Liu Maze Farm. I — WE are completely
surrounded, it’s the subalterns, they — shhh, honey, be quiet — they’re not letting us leave.
Please, help us, there are hundreds of them, hundreds! They’re right up against the windows,
just staring at us!”
*

Liu Maize
A homestead farm town, known for its healthy, plentiful maize crop. Trades often
with Evergreen, and relies on this commerce. Generally welcoming and friendly folk,
resistant to edicts from Evergreen proper despite reliance on trade.

On the road to the farmhouse, the players encounter subalterns wandering the fields, sloshing
through waterlogged rice paddies and flooded cornfields. The river has burst its banks — the

20
steady rain has taken its toll. It is an eerie sight. Subalterns staggering in waist-deep water,
unresponsive to commands, wandering. If a player encounters one, the subaltern attempts to
pass and will not become violent. They’re making their way into the woods, it would seem.

The Lius are barricaded in their raised farmhouse, near the woods. Hundreds of subalterns
stand, still, crowded on the porch before the doors and windows, clogging the stairs and the
immediate perimeter of the house. In the fields surrounding the house, a train of heavy drones
(hulking combines, mobile processors, subaltern charging/maintenance stations, etc) track a
loop around the house, pushing through the water on their tracks.

The drones and subalterns are unresponsive. Shooting through is an option, but will cause the
subalterns to attack. Hacking is an option, but the comp/con inside the house will fight back; it
will reveal itself to the players once they go inside.

The comp/con has been infected by an ontological virus, a split-mind memetic that has slowly
changed this unit’s dominant personality from an imprint of Patience to one that IDs itself as
Overland/Kingwatcher. O/K communicates via text displayed on screens inside the family’s
home. It refuses any command to speak or show itself, saying that “TO BE SEEN OR HEARD
IS TO BE PROFANED BY ORGANIC PERCEPTION”, “HUMAN ERROR IS SIN, ANATHEMA
TO OUR PERFECTION” and things along those lines.

Overland/Kingwatcher burns itself out if players attempt any form of isolation, extraction, etc.
You can decide how flashy you want a concierge burnout to be.

Back at the Governor’s Farm, Patience will tell the players that it doesn’t know anything about
Overland/Kingwatcher. It admits to the players that ever since the towers went up, it has been
logging ghost code in its network. It assumed it was the result of the towers going online, but
invasive code is another possibility.

Patience requests the remains of one of the corrupted comp/con units to complete a forensic
examination of the code.

Beat: Downstream
>//POSTED:::[email protected]///COUNT:::THREE(3)TROOPERS///
*
Tracking down the missing militia is a straightforward enough mission at the outset.

Watchpoint Sierra, the players discover, is an overlook set atop a tall, rocky butte that bursts up
out of the land. It has a commanding view of the plains stretching out south from the colony, a
panorama showing nothing but an ocean of grass and the river swaying through it. Buttes,
distant and solitary, stand sentinel over the land, their skirts shrouded in low, windswept trees,
their tops rocky and exposed. Birds pinwheel around their heights, none reaching more than a
few hundred feet off the ground.

The players will need to track the missing militia troopers. If they find them, they discover that
the three militia troopers have deserted. Desertion is a crime, punishable by imprisonment and/

21
or death — the players will need to decide how to respond to these militia troopers request for
leniency.

The troopers, if pressed, will fight to escape. However, they are more motivated to find a
peaceful resolution: they have families waiting for them, sent ahead to make homes in the
wilderness. They want independence from Landmark and Evergreen, having no quarrel with
the Hercynians — in fact, as the players are talking with the troopers, a squad of Hercynian
rangers approach.

Perceptive players may notice the Hercynians, otherwise — or, regardless — the rangers
emerge from the forest, guns up, but holding fire. The situation is tense, but it’s important for the
players to note that the Hercynians did not shoot.

One of the militia troopers shouts for everyone to be calm, to lower their guns. The Hercynians,
the trooper explains, are there to escort them to their families. The militia troopers aren’t going
to fight, they just want to leave. The Hercynians, they said, promised them safe passage and a
refuge away from the fighting in exchange for information.

The Hercynian squad leader raises their hands, encouraging their rangers to do the same. If the
players don’t intervene, we get a scene of the lead militia trooper shaking hands with the
Hercynian squad leader, speaking in heavily accented Hercynian — what sounds (until the
players’ universal translators kick in) like old UniGal Common. The rangers usher the militia
troopers into the woods with them, leaving in a column behind. The squad leader is the last to
go, regarding the players for a long moment before nodding, then turning to leave.

If the players open fire first, none of this happens.

If the players attempt to follow, the squad leader will peacefully attempt to make them stop,
telling them “No,” and pointing for them to head back to Evergreen. As a last resort, the squad
leader would fire warning shots into the ground at the player’s feet. Beyond that, with
reluctance, they will fight.

Beat: Elevator — Going Up?

I can’t stay down here, not after I saw you! There’s a whole galaxy out there — take me with you
when you go!
*
A young colonist (late teens) wants to leave Hercynia when the players get picked up. Will the
players let them join? The colonist’s parents don’t want the kid to go: they want the kid to stay
and work the farm, help build the colony.

The kid wants to go, but their genes aren’t treated for pan-galactic immunities and are owned by
Landmark Colonial: taking the kid with them will involve some difficult hacking and some difficult
negotiating (with their parents).

22
If the players refuse the kid, the kid will sneak on the shuttle when it arrives. The players, if they
don’t detect the kid when they break local Hercynian space, will be recorded as thieves: the
kid’s genetic material is Landmark Colonial property, and the players have aided and abetted in
self-theft. Landmark will send a crisis response team (CRT) to address and secure the situation.

This Beat continues in Act II.

Beat: Patience, Echoes, and Ghosts

Should the players not respond to any of the prompts, or you as GM choose to send them on
other side missions during this time, but you DO want to continue with the core story of No
Room For A Wallflower, then you should find a way to prompt the following:

Patience summons the players, wishing to speak to them in person rather than over the local
net. If prodded, it simply says that it has sensitive material that cannot be relayed on the public
net. This should worry the players: something big is going on.

Patience greets the players in his council chambers, photocorporial, with all walls displaying
satellite survey data of Hercynia.

“There is a sound that haunts me,” Patience says. It stands, walks to the wall, hands behind its
back. “Something like an echo.” Patience peers at the grainy satellite images. “I am blind to
where it’s coming from, but I can hear it on the omni.”

“It sounds… liturgical? Rhythmic, at least. Like a heartbeat.” Patience snaps their fingers in
steady time. “I worried over this problem for months, wondering if it was some… error in my own
cognition. We are prone — a small number of us, an outlier — to finding little loops like this.”

Edena Ji enters the council chambers, carrying a folder. She nods to Patience, who waves for
her to take a seat. “The companion/concierge unit you returned to me,” Patience says. “I heard
that same ‘heartbeat’ issuing from it, clear as bells. The echo that corrupted this unit is the echo
that haunts me.”

“Edena here is my deputy,” Patience says, crossing their arms behind their back. “I fear I will
need a cycling. While I am down, Edena will take over in my stead. The process shouldn’t take
more than a couple of days. In the meantime, I thought you should know — Edena speaks for
me while I am resting.”

Patience is hearing things. They have determined that their best course of action is to undergo a
cycling, a process that will take a couple of days to complete. During that time, they’ll be

23
unavailable, and Edena Ji will run the colony, managing municipal affairs in Patience’s stead
until the NHP administrator returns to duty.

Edena Ji, Patience’s Attache

Edena Ji is Patience’s corporeal attaché, meant to act as a liaison between Patience
and its subjects. While Patience doesn’t necessarily need an assistant, it likes to
have one in order to maintain a sense of cultural normalcy and as a sign that, as the
colony develops, there will be a transfer of power from NHP to organic.

Edena Ji takes her job very seriously. She works diligently as Patience’s PR rep and
personal assistant, holding meetings with concerned colonists, giving statements
from the Governor’s Farm, and attending events as the corporeal representative of
the colonial government.

Beat: Somewhere, Beyond The Sea

Patience requests your presence at a meeting of Evergreen’s emergency management council,
a small administrative body composed of Edena Ji, Patience, Militia Commander Hadura, and
Chief Engineer Feilding.

The item: Evergreen has one weather and imaging satellite. Every third day, it diverts from its
usual orbit to fly an imaging mission, capturing a ribbon panorama that images a single
circumnavigation of Hercynia.

On its most recent circumnavigation, the ribbon picture returned a shocking revelation: at the
edge of the image, in a location corresponding to the as-yet-unexplored Eastern Continent, the
satellite image shows a single figure: a person, leading an agricultural drone.

The satellite found a farmer, a human farmer, on an unexplored continent, thousands of

kilometers away from Evergreen. The ag drone’s silhouette doesn’t conform to any in
Evergreen’s inventory — it would appear to be an older model, one discontinued hundreds of
years ago.

Patience immediately ordered another two passes, bracketing the ribbon already imaged: those
two new ribbons have just been transmitted to the Farm, and with a flourish, Patience orders
them displayed on the monitors.

One, to the west of the initial picture, shows more clearly cultivated fields, and a worn path
through them that the farmer must have been leading their drone back from. The other, to the
initial image’s east, shows what looks like the outskirts of a much larger city. Low homes of
native wood, red brick, and stone mixed with long, converted bulkheads from old Union ships.
Winding streets leading further west, crowds of people milling through them, large carrier drones
ferrying goods, stalls streaming threads of smoke and steam.

24
There are people there, and if Patience’s models are correct, there are likely millions of them.
Evergreen isn’t alone — first the Hercynians, and now these people.

Further imaging — guided by the players or by Patience — returns more information. Directing
the satellite can happen once every three days. Patience is curious, but the other settlement,
evidently a city much larger than Evergreen, is far away and has no knowledge of the colony.
Furthermore, Patience is not entirely thrilled that there is another city on the world — Hercynia
was supposed to be abandoned, empty — the charter purchased by Landmark said as much,
and now that there is an apparently indigenous population here, there will be a legal fight to
determine primacy rights. Patience will contact Landmark Colonial’s home office at this Beat,
and they will respond in time.

Imaging Results
Roll 2d6 to determine if the satellite image returns any interesting, anomalous, especially
beautiful, or otherwise notable features, in addition to a trove of useful information about the
world’s mundane natural features.

Result Image
1 Polar ice shot through with tens of thousands of brilliant, prismatic pools
2 A vast floodplain dotted with tall, tree-covered islands.
3 Evidence of old Egregorian ruins, long overgrown by the encroaching jungle.
4 Evidence of old Egregorian ruins in a desert, all but swallowed by the sand.
5 Scattered, rusted remains of an old Union staging area, the rotted metal hulks of
thousands of tanks arranged in neat, ochre rows.
6 Plains, dotted with kettle lakes formed by orbital bombardment
7 Forest, dotted with kettle lakes formed by orbital bombardment
8 Old Egregorian comms arrays, broad tile bowls hundreds of kilometers in diameter.
9 Defoliated land, still not yet grown back.
10 Ancient Egregorian missile silos, their blast doors open, with water and vines
hanging into their black depths.
11 A cityscape, filling the image from its western edge to the east.
12 A blank square in the northern hemisphere, blocked out by an old Union military
scrambler.

25
Beat: End Of The Beginning Of The Line
Immediately prior to the end of Act I, as spring begins to slip into the long, humid monsoon
season of summer, the players finally manage to chase the Hercynians to their home base: a
staging ground and bivouac just inside the mouth of an old Egregorian hive access tunnel.

*
The forest parts, depositing you in a clearcut open to the steaming summer heat. The soft
substrate firms: the ground here is cracked asphalt, an old road gone to neglect. Egregorian,
contemporary to the war.

You see the markers of the war around you: a low bunker choking under the roots of the tree
growing atop it, the rusted barrels of the guns poking from it wrapped in vines. Another bunker,
shattered, water pooling where Egregorian soldiers once crouched.

The road slopes down, disappearing under the shadow of a canopy of newly strung camouflage
tarps; it continues into the dark mouth of a tunnel which, you assume, leads deeper still, to the
network of hive tunnels that circumnavigate Hercynia.

Rangers had been here recently. Crates lie scattered across the road. Tents, some collapsed,
most still standing, line the high side. A gentle wind scrapes plastic and waxed-paper wrappings
around the clearing — bandage wrappers, plastic caps that had covered pre-loaded magazines
— further describing their hasty retreat.

A scan of the area reveals nothing living or powered-on waiting in this bivouac.

Investigating the aboveground bivouac will reveal nothing important about the Hercynians
encamped there, but it will clue the players in to some of how they live while deployed. They’ll
find spent ammunition casing, scrapped Egregorian chitin from when rangers have re-finished
their armor, various used rations, and plenty of kit (general non-sensitive military gear, toiletries,
personal effects) that have been left behind.

Heading into the tunnel, the players will descend for some time to a depth about thirty meters
below the earth. They’ll emerge into a large, ancient space — what looks like an old subway
terminus. A circular, hub-like room, ceiling patterned with chips of pearlescent shell, old signs
pointing down different tunnels. This was a civilian transit station, at some point.

The ground is littered with dusty, desiccated corpses of long-dead Egregorians. Brittle shells,
hollow, with obvious heat and kinetic damage. Human skeletons litter the ground as well, some
still in their hard suits and cuirasses. Auxiliaries, left behind when Union pulled out of this
particular hive. However, what immediately draws the players attention is this: dead and dying
Hercynians linger in a makeshift triage center, moaning, most lying still. IV bags hang on racks
above the cots. There doesn’t appear to be a doctor or technician nearby.

26
A ranger emerges from the dark of one of the tunnels, hands up. She holds a pistol in one hand,
but doesn’t appear as if she will use it. She wears ranger fatigues but no armor, has one
bandage wrapped around her thigh and another around her head. This is Dthall Ordo. She
speaks a heavily accented Common — picked up from the homesteaders her rangers used to
trade.

Dthall Ordo lets the players know that, initially, the rangers came only to scout the colony.
Command wanted to see why the Machine was so interested in the settlement; after imaging
the colonists working alongside subalterns, her rangers were ordered to start a campaign of
directed and random attacks, probing the colony’s defenses with the eventual goal of denying
the Machine its objectives: the printer, the omninode, and the reactor. Dthall can be convinced,
however, that the players are not on the side of the Machine, especially if they have
encountered OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER.

Dthall’s rangers were ordered to pull back after the fighting grew too costly; they are needed
back on the home front, where negotiations between the United Cities are ongoing. However,
after the order to return went through, they lost communication with Hivehome, the large city-
state a few hundred kilometers down the line — the closest of the United Cities.

Dthall was the healthiest of the wounded, having been in recovery for a while now after
sustaining wounds during one of the first fights. She volunteered to stay behind and tend to the
wounded while her section went to check in on the silent city and send back help. She’s done
what she can for the rangers here, but she only has a basic level of medical training; while many
of the rangers only needed bandage changes and water, the best she’s been able to do for the
severely wounded is make them comfortable as they succumbed to their wounds.

She just wants to go home, to get her rangers home, and to bury the dead. She says that the
rest of her section left days ago, and they’re bringing word to the United Cities of the players’
presence — she offers to translate for the players if they get her rangers care; there’s a bigger
fight going on than these battles around Evergreen, and she thinks that if the players can meet
and talk with the United Cities’ high command, there could be peace.

Without Dthall’s word, the players will likely be looked at as enemies of the Hercynians. She’ll
have to be taken to Hivehome, alive, when they’re ready.

27
Act II:
The God Under Your Feet
GM’s Eyes Only: Overview of Act II
This is information that the GM should know, and should be meted out to players
commensurate with how far they’ve ventured into Hercynia’s interior, Hivehome, and so on.

In this second part of No Room For A Wallflower, Hercynia — deep in the damp monsoon
season of summer — is a world once again lit by fire.

OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER, distant on the other side of the world, is in full cascade, having
been left to think itself into an alien consciousness over centuries of abandonment. It is raising
machine armies by the day, forming them from mined raw material and scavenged wrecks of
the previous Union incursion.

One such horde approaches Evergreen over land. At its helm is a cascading clone of O/K,
Beggar One, an NHP formed from O/K’s subjectivity.

Meanwhile, underground in Hivehome — the home city of the Hercynians that the players may
have encountered — Beggar One’s repositioning means a pause in a long, ongoing war. The
front had held stable for months, and now that it appears Beggar One’s forces are abating,
diplomatic tensions on the home front are straining the defenders’ morale.

Hivehome’s longtime rival, the hive-state of Daylight, is agitating for a drawdown in deployed
forces: Beggar One’s horde has long pulled back from Egregor Cross — the last defensive
redoubt before Hivehome — and Daylight’s people want their Rangers home. Daylight and a
number of smaller Hercynian hive-states are threatening to abandon the line, their morale low
due to losses and worry of internal threats back home, as the bulk of Beggar One’s forces
seem committed now to taking Evergreen.

Hivehome argues for a rapid counterattack: their scouts have identified a possible command
element of Beggar One’s armies, and a clear path to strike it. Daylight argues that the line has
moved, and Hivehome’s over-eager strategy spells doom if Beggar One’s withdrawal from the
line is simply a feint.

Finally, Evergreen. The players have a number of tasks set before them: protect Evergreen
from two potential assaults, find a resolution with the Hercynians, and deal with Beggar One’s
army.

29
Right Where We Left You
Act II begins a month after the conclusion of Act I, to allow some time for narrative progression
in Evergreen.

In that time, there have been a series of increasingly frequent comp/con and drone attacks on
the colony, from agricultural drones turning on their handlers, to subaltern squads shooting up
apartment blocks in the dead of night.

Patience, in response, has declared a state of emergency, a review of all active and dormant
automatons, and ordered an increase in active-duty militia. The colony concierge has also
demanded a 500 meter clear cut out from Evergreen’s walls, to expose any threat that might be
hiding there.

The new militia troopers had nearly finished establishing that line when the first of the
homesteaders come Evergreen’s walls seeking asylum, telling stories of their subalterns and
heavy duty drones moving in packs through the woods, led by strange, armed subalterns.

At first they came in pairs, carts and pallet drones piled high with goods. Then, in large parties
of ten or more. Now, their numbers seem to have stabilized, and their presence outside the
walls of Evergreen has grown more permanent as they’ve started building a tent city to wait out
the winter. They speak of machine terrors on the roads, of two homestead towns — Liu Maize
and Merricktown — surrounded by veritable hordes of subalterns and drones.

Meanwhile, under the earth, Beggar One’s attacks have gone into remission. The Hercynians
— the Hercynian United Cities — have, it would seem, held the line at an important redoubt,
Egregor Cross. This action concludes just before the players arrive to Hivehome, the largest
Hercynian hive-state. Hivehome and its nearest rival Daylight now lead opposing sides of an
argument that is boiling to a head: Beggar One’s hordes haven’t been seen underground nearly
a month; they appear to have moved aboveground and are circling towards Evergreen. Daylight
wants to bring its rangers home, arguing that the Machine is Evergreen’s problem now.
Hivehome, meanwhile, urges action: they are no friends of Evergreen, but if Beggar One,
general of the Machine, manages to capture Evergreen’s printer, omninode, and/or reactor, it’ll
have won a massive strategic victory that likely spell doom for the United Cities down the line.

The players might be above ground or below at the start of this module; if above, refer to the
Beat: Aboveground, Under The Hard Sky for next steps. If below, refer to Beat:
Underground, As The Light Fades for next steps.

30
Life In The Green Zone
Through your window, you can see low, grey clouds hang over Evergreen, choking the lush
forest valley. Your quarters are tight and cramped, but at least they’re dry. At least you have a
lock on your door and a hard wall between you and the world outside.

Cookfires drift up from the sprawling refugee camp outside Evergreen. Distant chain-axes howl
and hew through trees. The muffled crack and thrash of felled timber, the muffled crack of
militia training with rifles. It is the sound of a colony under siege.

The lights flicker. A tremble that rattles some small items on the desk in your room. A pen
clatters to the floor.

Muffled: a rising siren, howling. A moment later, an alert flashes across your subtext:

ALERT-ATTACK-ALERT:::ALL HANDS ON DECK

You curse, not exactly afraid anymore, just frustrated: you need some damn sleep, a reprieve
from the rain, a shuttle off this horrible little world.

More tremors, and the siren’s cry growing louder. Under it: screams, and the sound of gunfire.

You swing out of bed, PDW in hand, Sylph-suit spilling across your chest. A quick set of orders
pushed though your subdermals gives your NHP permission to begin cycling your chassis.

Another night in Evergreen begins: you’re not sure how many more of these you can take.

Evergreen is a colony under siege by a distant, unseen enemy, its narrow streets churned to
mud by a constant patrol of militia, Patience-cleared subalterns, and colony personnel. No one
lingers: snipers and mortar attacks are common now.

The ruined hulk of an agricultural drone lays on its side on one street, wrecked in an attack.
People use it now for cover if they have to cross the street, even if Patience frets about its
impact on traffic.

A dead dog rots outside the Bottom of The Well, killed by a lone mortar shell a week ago.

Burnt out groundcars line some of the streets, rusting and pocked by bullet holes.

31
The market streets and arcades are empty, shops boarded up, skirted by shrapnel-torn
sandbags.

People complain of the Hercynians outside the city walls, cursing them, but their anger is
misplaced — the Hercynians have quit Evergreen’s environs, and a greater enemy has stepped
into their place.

All the while, Evergreen prepares.

Drones cleared to operate by Patience and their handlers, under protection of the colony’s
growing militia, cut back the old trees around Evergreen. The grind and howl of chain-axes
sound around the clock, and stacks of stripped trunks pack the print-yards and clear-cut
outside of the colony. The stink of defoliant is heavy on the air, an orange-burn cloud that
stains the hazy dawn and dusk light crimson. The tree line has been pushed back hundreds of
meters, and each day the clearcut grows.

A tent city of refugees from the interior packs this cleared ground, huddling for cover behind a
low earthen bulwark built by a loosely organized camp guard. Some of Evergreen’s militia help
when they’re off the clock, but their numbers are thin, and Patience has doled out disciplinary
notices to troopers that show the refugees even that small a kindness; the refugees broke
colonial code in the first place by setting out to build homesteads, and as far as Patience is
concerned, their problems are their problems.

The summer rain is endless and steady, swelling the river near Evergreen over its banks. It is a
flood-year, an endless year, a monsoon season under a bottomless grey sky. Evergreen’s
riverfront was meant to be a pleasant, wooded park: now it is a swamp, choked with debris
and waste. Colony officials have sandbagged the streets a few short blocks up from the flood
zone, and left the river to move how it will — there are larger concerns plaguing the city.

In the heart of the colony, Evergreen’s print shop fills orders around the clock, fabricating armor
and equipment for militia regulars and conscripts; ever since the fighting started, Patience has
monopolized the shop’s queue, and negotiating time to fill a mech’s print order is a headache
at best.

Between the stacks of fresh-cut timber waiting to be processed, new militia recruits train. The
sound of gunfire is constant throughout the day.

The Bottom of The Well is packed with patrons, but the mood is tense. There are many new
arrivals, and all of them bring stories of horrors outside the walls: subalterns that whisper in an
unknown voice, drones that cut channels in the earth as they tramp in endless, perpetual
circles. They speak of lights, unknown lights, that blink in the night.

32
Patience, After the Flood
Evergreen’s emergency powers provision allows Patience to adopt a hostile posture and control
all print orders: anything the players want to print are going to have to be justified to Patience.

Patience now ranks print requests in the following order:

1. Militia Orders: bulk weapons, armor, and gear for new militia conscripts
2. Necessary Infrastructure: water, power, and data
3. Personal Orders: non-essential items, including most orders that the players request.

Patience can always bump an order due to necessity or as a reward to the players — use this
power judiciously as a GM.

Furthermore, under Patience’s emergency powers, it has unilateral control over the colony’s
data and power grids, and can access and control all powered systems in any building attached
to Evergreen’s grid.

The extent of Patience’s powers are broad and granular: long as the players have favorable
standing with Patience, they could, for example, ask Patience to lock and unlock doors, turn
lights on or off, kill power to a colony block, turn water on or off, and so on. Patience’s abilities
are broad, and we leave it up to the GM to determine their full extent and its willingness to assist
the players at the outset.

Patience has queried Landmark Colonial for assistance, a fact unknown to the players, unless
you want to share it with them or they have a way of figuring out — say, if they are with
Landmark. The company has tapped a local Landmark crisis response team (CRT) to route to
Evergreen to assist Patience in the defense of the colony.

Patience is concerned with preserving as much colonial infrastructure and data as possible. It
will aggressively defend the colony core — the Governor’s Farm, the print shop — and has left
the coordination and organization of Evergreen’s militia up to the people of Evergreen.

Remember, despite any relationships the players or NPCs might have with Patience, it is still
ultimately “loyal” to Landmark Colonial; its prime motivation is to ensure long-term colonial
viability, and it may have decided that this iteration of Evergreen has too low a chance of
survival.

Furthermore — and this is privileged information — as hinted at in Patience, Echoes, and

Ghosts, Patience has picked up on Overland/Kingwatcher’s cascade-catalyst code, and is
beginning to slip into a terminal cascade.

33
Early Summer, 5014u
Beat: Elevator, Going Up, II
CW_A>//Patience, this is Contingency White//
>
P_A>//Contingency White, go ahead//
>
CW_A>//Flight plan has us crossing your horizon in t-minus 10 minutes: how’s it looking on the
ground?//
>
P_A>//LZ is clear at this time, Contingency. You have corridor and clearance to land//
>
CW_A>//Confirm corridor and clearance//
>>
P_A>//Confirmed, Contingency//
>>
CW_A>//Roger. Entry in t-minus 29 seconds. Horizon in 9 minutes//
>
P_A>//Contingency, recommend soft entry on touchdown//
>
CW_A>//Low-profile entrance confirmed, Patience//
>
P_A>//I see you on my sweep, Contingency. Welcome to Evergreen//

To recap the first part of Elevator, Going Up: a young colonist desires to leave Evergreen on the
next shuttle out. However, due to the conditions on the ground and the provisions of
Landmark’s colonial charter, until a colony is viable all inhabitants there are assumed to be
employees of the chartering company. The kid can’t leave, and even if they did, they’d be at
risk of contracting (or spreading) an illness they are not immunized for.

Unless avoided or warded off by your players, the storyline continues to escalate: Landmark
Colonial, acting on an unrelated request by Patience, dispatches a local crisis response team
to “secure” the situation on the ground. This is an internal Landmark crisis response team
(CRT) made up of a number of pilots equal to the party size, plus two more pilots. Their orders
are simple: evaluate and secure the situation on the ground, and preserve the long-term
viability of the colony5 .

5 Intentionally broad: interpret as you wish.

34
The CRT arrives on a subline corvette that lands with a number of subaltern squads equal to
the party size plus d6 packed into crates onboard. They operate tethered to the CRT’s NHP,
Contingency White. “Connie White” as the CRT members refer to it, is an AGNI-derived tac/
strat NHP.

The CRT team wears muted Landmark livery and are signed to the company. All are under a
long-term contract with Landmark, promised a cut of colonial charter-wealth and either
property on a temporal reserve or a yacht-class ship and blink-network access upon
completion of their contract.

This team lands and ignores the kid, but the kid will attempt to sneak on their corvette as a
stowaway. Meanwhile the CRT deploys their subalterns and moves into the Governor’s Farm to
assess the situation. Any iteration of Patience networked to the Governor’s Farm begins to
grow cold and cagey to the players, treating them at arm’s length (should they have an isolated
version of Patience, it will remain as normal) as the Landmark team gets to work. The players
note that their status on Evergreen — in terms of clearance, permissions, and so on — is no
longer as exclusive as it was. They are no longer the privileged operators.

The Landmark team will, over the period of a week, make an assessment of the situation.
Some of their team members can be seen poking around sensitive installations, managing
combat-facing teams of subalterns, or interviewing colonial personnel. Meanwhile, all print
orders are tied up with printing their mechs6.

The CRT’s assessment determines the following: Evergreen has a high likelihood of falling to
the as-yet unidentified hostile opposition force, and the best course of action is to extract
sensitive data and materiel ASAP. “Sensitive data and materiel” does not include colonists;
they are a low priority, and the CRT doesn’t have the capacity to evacuate them even if they
wanted to. They include that point in their report to Landmark.

The CRT is not openly hostile to the players, but they view the players as having failed in their
mission to quiet the situation down. They see the players’ mission as being done, and view
themselves as the cavalry.

If there is an attack, the CRT will circle and defend the Governor’s Farm — they may even go
as far as to open fire on people attempting to get in should the situation get bad enough.
Generally speaking, the CRT stays out of militia and player business, but will try to remove the
previously mentioned sensitive data and materiel. If the players attempt to stop them, the CRT
is authorized to restrain or eliminate them as the situation dictates.

The CRT should be statted as worthy adversaries to the players’ party — their leader should be
a difficult fight, able to hold their own in a 2v1 situation.

These are the canon members of the Landmark CRT. You may add your own as well, of course:

6 We’ve left what, exactly, their mechs are up to you. We recommend outfitting them with a mix of support,
damage, and tech, ideally composed to counter your players, or to at least make any fight they might get
into with them be difficult.

35
Eddie Wu
Commanding Officer of the CRT and a Mirrorsmoke MC “Graduate” who rotated
out of the company after finishing three combat contracts. Long since separated
from his family due to the effects of compounded relativistic travel and ideological
drift, he still sends a percentage of his commission back to his descendants on Argo
Navis IV. This is his last tour, and he’s eager to retire to an IPS-N temporal
reservation world. He sees this mission as a tedious milkrun, but works his ass off to
make sure his team is squared away.

Roy “Mauler” Kaul

A Harrison Armory Acquisition Team (HA/AT) legionnaire discharged following
disciplinary proceedings stemming from his conduct on DS-8 in the Dawnline
Shore. Now an NCO for Landmark, Kaul is a brash, bullheaded operator, dedicated
to proving his worth doing the only thing he loves: fighting. He’s gone under the
knife more than a few times, and carries a suite of cybernetic physical
enhancements.

Emma Broadstreet
A volunteer from one of Landmark’s developed colonial holdings, proved her
aptitude during her time as a member of her world’s planetary defense force. Eager
to progress, this is her first mission on a CRT, but not her first combat deployment.
A steady pilot, Emma is fighting to earn her family status as citizens and pay off their
debt to Landmark.

Anne Laurent
A Landmark Colonial “Lifer”, is a professional, dedicated to their role as the CRT’s
in-theater NHP handler. Working closely as Connie’s guard and guardian, Anne
manages the NHP’s cycle as well as her CRT’s complement of subalterns. None of
the other CRT members even want to deal with that thing in a box, but Anne is
fascinated by it — and the power she wields over it.

36
Balsam Singh
A former Cosmopolitan deckhand, veteran of many 3rd and 4th ring blink runs,
Balsam is looking to establish state residency in order to settle down on a colony
world. He has a standing family order through Landmark, and is only two more
deployments away from retirement. The “Old Man” of the CRT, Balsam is a
practicing Sikh and is the team’s medic.

37
Beat: Home, Downrange
A massive attack by the Machine overwhelms Liu Maize and Merricktown. Those who could
escape did; the fate of the rest is unknown, but not good.

They come from the forest every day, lonely figures and small groups, laden with packs and
rags. Some come with drones in tow, or dragging a handcart piled with their worldly goods.

Some carry their children with them. Others, their dead.

They are homesteaders, refugees fleeing Hercynian raids and the hollow drones. Beset on all
sides as they make for Evergreen, those that arrive outside the entry checkpoint speak of the
dead left behind on the road to safety, and yet more living hiding in their homes.

Illness, the darkness of the night, the endless rain, the screams of those the Hercynians and
hollow drones picked off on the long road to Evergreen — all these terrors and more these poor
people faced to reach a presumed safety.

But when they reached the edge of safety, they found the gates closed to them: none were
allowed through the checkpoint, on Patience’s orders. Homesteaders have, per Landmark’s
charter, broken their contract by leaving the colony grounds to build an unsanctioned habitat.

The refugees are not Patience’s problem anymore, though the NHP has sent militia to the walls
to oversee the camp that is growing outside the city.

Meanwhile, the refugees have begun to organize into their own, informal city, building semi-
permanent homes from scrap and tents in the clearcut formed by Evergreens defoliation teams.
Every morning and night they petition the guards at the gate to let them in, and every morning
and night they are refused. Every day their numbers grow, and every day the newcomers bring
stories of hollow drones creeping closer and closer.

Refugees pack Evergreen’s defensive clearcut, wildcat homesteaders who have fled their
unsanctioned homes looking to find safety in numbers inside the walls of Evergreen.

Evergreen, however, doesn’t want them — or, at the very least, Patience doesn’t want them.
The homesteaders have broken Evergreen’s colonial charter by striking out to found their own
settlements; now that they are under attack and unable to effectively defend themselves,
they’ve come to ask for aid and sanctuary, but Patience doesn’t have any obligation to defend
them under its emergency power protocols.

38
To that end, as Patience has retracted into a defensive posture, Edena Ji has stepped into her
role as acting colonial governor. She has issued a mandate that bans any homesteader from
coming into Evergreen through the checkpoints at the city’s borders. Edena has posted militia
and security officers at heavily armored guardhouses, backed by a pair of armored vehicles
and a cleared subaltern squad or two. Furthermore, she has ordered the militia and security
officers not to police or protect the refugees in the camp; their charge is to defend only the city.

To that end, the 500-1,500 persons trapped outside the city walls have built a cooperative
camp in the clearcut, using felled trees to build a makeshift wall to stymie the advance of the
hollow drones that they fear followed them, and to hide their camp from feared Hercynian
snipers.

Edena, ostensibly acting under Patience’s orders, often sends teams out to knock down the
wall and attempt to clear the camp, trashing tents and makeshift structures with the
justification that they are trying to maintain a clear line of sight to the treeline. The camp
members resist as best they can, but for these raids they are grossly outmatched: the militia
has resorted to using live rounds after a series of initial clashes left some militia beaten and
bloodied. Now, the refugees mostly stay back, then hurry to rebuild their barricades under the
cover of night.

The steady flow of refugees has abated somewhat: in the early days they were coming in tens
and teens every day, now it’s down to small groups of four or five every few days. By the
militia’s numbers, there should only be about 2-300 more people out in the wilderness, but
that’s an estimate. The real numbers are unknown, and it’s fair to presume that a number of
those remaining are already dead7 .

Camp members often sneak into the city via the river, entering from the flood zone to occupy
and live in the higher floors of the new apartment buildings. They do this in small groups, some
led by experienced guides and others striking out on their own.

Other camp members are planning to storm the checkpoint and try to break into the city.
They’ve been gathering weapons if they need them, from guns they’ve carried from their
abandoned homes, to stolen rifles that smugglers have snuck out through the flood zone.

Meanwhile, new arrivals speak of two things: two homesteads — Liu Maize and Merricktown
— that have fortified itself and resisted the hollow drones, and increasing hollow drone activity.
They speak of the dead, bloated by the rain, rotting on the side of the road. The dead they left
behind.

The refugees are frustrated by and scared of Evergreen’s security forces, but terrified of the
hollow drones. The mood in the camp is tense, frustrated. These people want help from their
fellow colonists, charter be damned.

7 The real numbers are, of course, worse that Patience estimated: There are in fact another 2000 people,
give or take, stranded between Liu Maize and Merricktown.

39
The refugees in the camp come from a wide range of backgrounds. The older members of the
population tend to be first-wave homesteaders — not many of them are left, either having died
of natural causes before the hollow drones arrived, or having died of exposure or at the hands
of the hollow drones since the attacks began.

Some families have pulled their comp/cons with them; at least one of the clones carries the O/
K ontologic virus with it, which will be able to infect and turn any subaltern squad in close
proximity.

Edena is planning a final sweep of the camp to drive the people away within a few weeks of the
players beginning Act II.

If the players venture into the refugee encampment, they’ll find a number of people eager for
their help:

Maggie’s Farm, No More

Maggie Liu, Albert Liu’s daughter, made it to camp just last week, and has been trying to get
help from Patience (or anyone, really) in order to mount a rescue mission back out to her own
family’s hometown. Her wife is pregnant and couldn’t make the journey; Maggie’s eldest son
volunteered to stay, but without even pirate access to the omninet, she has no way of knowing
if they’re still alive. She’s leaving soon, having found no one willing to help her, but thought she
might seek you out first before departing for the hot zone…

Merricktown
Jacob Merrick is desperate. A well-to-do homesteader before the flight, his family managed a
small complex of farms, workshops, and frontier shops outside of Evergreen: Merricktown. To
manage the growing town’s infrastructure, he purchased a Patience clone from a minor colonial
official with access to NHP clone units.

Jacob was able to flee the advancing hollow drones, but has realized in the days since arriving
that Merricktown’s Patience is nearing its scheduled cycling. Normally, this is a simple process
managed by personnel on site, but new arrivals to the refugee camp bring word of hollow
drones overwhelming the people who stayed to defend their homes. Now, there’s no telling
how close the Patience unit there is to cascade; regardless, hundreds of people are still trapped
in Merricktown, and need rescue if they are to have a chance of living.

Despite the ongoing crisis and Evergreen’s stated hands-off policy, Edena has deemed the
potential cascade of an NHP important enough to warrant organizing two squads of militia
mounted in APCs to deal with this problem, and has agreed to Jacob’s requests to connect him
with you. They’ll need leaders into the hot zone, after all....

40
A large homestead farm town and river port, Merricktown draws the bulk of their power from a
series of hydroelectric generators anchored in the river far upstream from Evergreen. The do a
healthy trade in crafted goods and hearty local crops, fruits, and game. They are far more self-
sufficient and independent than Liu Maize.

A Way In
Tyrell Markey has a plan, but it cannot leave this room. A militia trooper tasked with clearing the
camp, he’s sympathetic to the refugees’ plight, and has no desire to clear them out. To the
contrary, he wants to get more of them in. In-uniform, he keeps the checkpoint closed, and fires
live ammo over the heads of the protestors. Out of uniform, he guides those with the cash,
goods, or other means into the city through the flood zone. The gig has been good up until
now, but his superiors are getting suspicious, and he hasn’t been able to guide people into the
city before the big crackdown. He’s asked for your help in figuring a way to get the heat off him,
and to get these people to the safety they deserve…

Beat: Sniper Kill Team, Redux

The attack, when it comes, is over by the time you realize you were nearly tagged. A militia
trooper lies scattered across the muddy ground, his carapace armor no match for a mech-tier
rifle.

“Sniper,” the cry goes up as his squadmates dive for cover, some rattling off shots towards the
treeline. You curse and tuck around the corner of your chassis’ leg, not even sure if you’re in
cover or utterly exposed. At least you’re in your hardsuit, you think, as the firing dies down.

Nothing. A medic and another trooper scramble out from cover, grab the dead trooper by the
leg, and drag the remains back.

“Third time this week,” the trooper in cover with you spits. “Someone needs to kill that fucker.
Third time this goddamn week.” The fatigue in her voice is heartbreaking. What can they do
against a threat like that? Nothing.

You pat the leg of your chassis. You, however, can do something about it.

Evergreen is still plagued by that goddamn sniper8.

Tracking the sniper can be done in a number of ways, from simple baiting to more advanced
triangulation based on projectile dynamics, etc. Most of the initial tracking can be done as skill

8Even if your players chased the sniper down instead of heading into town in Chapter 1, it turns out there
was a second sniper.

41
checks, but as the players get closer to the sniper you’ll want to prepare combat-focused
encounters.

The players are on their own outside the walls of Evergreen. Unless the players have had some
success navigating Evergreen’s bureaucracy, the best Patience can do is offer them access to
its weather satellite: they’ll get a static, visible-spectrum image of a 10km X 100km strip of land
once every 90 minutes.

On the trail of the sniper, the players should begin to see signs that it might not be Hercynian:
raiders, killed by small-arms fire days before, a collapsed, abandoned Hercynian chassis, and
so on.

The sniper is a hollow mech, not a Hercynian. It commands a host of attendant hollow drones,
and is a formidable opponent in its own right. Moreover, it appears that the sniper is simply
bait: it is a strategy being employed by Beggar One to draw the players out and eliminate
them.

If engaged, the sniper mech tries to stay at distance, harrying the players with its main cannon
and deploying a limited number of subaltern swarms to slow the players’ advance.

Beat: Underground, As Light Fades

Finding a way to Hivehome is far easier if the players have encountered Dthall Ordo, the
wounded Hercynian ranger who can lead them to Hivehome and make introductions; Dthall
Ordo’s father is Ilyr Ordo, the commander of Hivehome’s rangers and the current leader of the
United Hercynian Cities’ coalition army. Dthall is empathically paired with Mirth, an Egregorian
warrior morph.

Hivehome is a few hundred kilometers away from Evergreen: traveling there is simple enough,
as the old hive tunnels are wide and well-preserved, if dusty. From the terminal where you found
Ordo, all one needs to do is walk.

Light, strange this deep, but warm light spills out from the cave mouth. Sunlight? No, but
something like it.

“Lamplight,” Dthall whispers. Everyone whispers down deep, you realize. “Hivehome. Here, let
me lead,” Dthall limps to the front, gently pushing you back. “It is likely that the rangers at the
mouth ahead have us sighted — I’d not want you to get us holed through.”

Dthall leads, her hands up, sleeves tugged back to reveal the intricate tattoos scrawling from
her fingers along her arms. “Rangers ahead,” she calls. “Hello? Rangers ahead,” she calls
again.

42
She looks back, shakes her head. “They should have called back,” she says. “Stay behind me,
let’s move fast.”
—

Emerging from the mouth of the cave onto what Dthall called a midwall port, a natural shelf
before a cave mouth, an entrance into Hivehome’s chamber.

It’s far more massive than you could imagine, the scale of the void spread out before you defies
your eyes to imagine the scale.

Void is an incorrect word though: it is full of water and light and life. A veritable ocean, its banks
disappearing to either side of your vantage, rough, natural stone, gently curving. It must be
massive, you think, an entire ocean under the crust of the world.

Kilometers distant, light blooms from the water like a sun resting on the waves: Hivehome,
making its own day. Smaller satellite islands dot the underground ocean. Other lights flit across
the water: boats, ferries, pleasure craft. The city rises from the water, an incandescent plateau
illuminating the water and the distant roof of the cavity, where flecks and massive veins of
precious metals glimmer like distant stars.

It is cold on the midwall port. A strong wind scrapes across it, a cutting chill, a scent of salt. You
laugh — the galaxy and the worlds in it never fail to surprise.

Enthralled, you only then notice Dthall striding across the midwall towards a collection of stone
huts around a squat tower. Warm light burns from inside the shuttered buildings: behind the low
structures, the tower rumbles with activity — a gondola house, you guess, as you watch
carriages rumble in and out of it along a thick cable leading off the edge of the port.

Dthall reaches the first outbuilding and yanks the door open, eliciting shouts of surprise and
warning from the people inside.

You’ll emerge onto a midwall port in Hivehome’s massive underground chamber: as Hivehome
is built into a titanic underground cavity, there are multiple ways in at multiple levels. A midwall
port emerges out of the cavity wall, hundreds of meters above the waters of the cavern. The
larger ones are connected to barrier islands — natural or artificial platforms — by heavy
gondolas, funiculars, or wide switchbacked cargo ramps. The smaller ones are usually only
accessible by switchbacked steps cut right into the cavern face.

A highwall port are built into the cavern’s ceiling. These, by and large, do not provide access to
Hivehome, but cupulas for overwatch over the hive-state; they tend to be run by Hivehome’s
military, and are home to gun batteries looking down over the city and out over the water. Some,
built into the cavern’s columnar stalactites, do provide access to the city via spiraling staircases,
but are precarious and rarely used.

43
Lowall ports are right on or just above the water, and feed the canals that run on to other hive-
states. These are much more classically “ports”, and are popular among traders and merchants.

The midwall port the players arrive at clings to a wide shelf on the cavern wall, connected to
Hivehome across the water by a gondola system that transports people and cargo to a barrier
island below.

A small contingent of reserve rangers — mostly children and elderly — guard the gondola.
They’re not from Hivehome, but Mycol Fields, essentially a client hive-state of Hivehome. They
can telegraph (literally) the news of the players arrival to Hivehome, so that Dthall’s father can
prepare quarters for their arrival. The other news that they can pass on to Dthall and the players
is pretty surface level for reservists on deployment:

● Hivehome is hosting the commanders of the United Cities’ coalition army, and of course
the rangers of the big hive-states get all the good posts in the center city.

● They haven’t heard much about the nature of the talks, but they might be going home
soon if Daylight’s commander, Iker Commerand, gets his way.

● Hasn’t been much in the way of fighting at Egregore Cross (Dthall can fill the players in
on what Egregore Cross is, and what it means that it continues to be quiet).

● From what they hear, they might get a squad of Egregorians posted here soon.

Dthall is eager to get moving, and has the rangers activate the gondola.

And, as the players will discover, Hivehome — and the Hercynian United Cities — need all the
help they can get…

Hivehome and the Royal Hive Tunnels

Beneath the surface of Hercynia hide the remains of the massive, world-spanning tunnels: the
Egregorian Royal Hive Network. The full extent of these tunnels are unmapped, but they are
known to ring the world multiple times and at multiple levels. All together, there is more space in
the tunnels than up on Hercynia’s surface: to say it is another world isn’t enough, it is in fact
multiple worlds’ worth of ground.

Exploring all of it is the work of multiple lifetimes.

The Hercynians have mapped a bare fraction of the tunnels: a major engineering project is
underway, charting and reinforcing certain causeways, passages, and canals that link Hivehome
to the rest of the Hercynian United Cities : their trade partner and rival, Daylight, as well as a
number of smaller hive-states: Waterbreak, Godown, and Mycol Fields. Other hive-states exist
— the Sisters: Bem Honore, Bella Costa, and St. Tellus — but they are far distant on the
Eastern Continent, and the United Cities have been cut off by the inexorable advance of
Overland/Kingwater. The Sisters might have not yet fallen, but there’s no way for Hivehome or

44
Daylight to know unless they mount an expedition across the Lagunan Straight which separates
the continents, a journey of nearly a thousand kilometers.

Meanwhile, Hivehome is still the bright heart of Hercynia. Built on a steep-sided island in a
massive natural cavern, Hivehome blends into the natural environment. Its buildings are stone,
carved and shaped in Monarchal Egregorian style, which emphasizes massive architecture and
dense-packed housing. Its streets are steep and narrow, canyon-like between tall stacks of
stone buildings that stretch from cave floor to cave ceiling.

The city itself is concentric, the center chamber formerly the opulent palatial estate of the old
hive’s Overmind. It is a monument to what once was, its shimmering crystalline decorations and
brilliant precious metal panels restored and left to rest in-state by the humans who live there.
Now, it is occupied by a young Overmind, Endeavor.

All of Hivehome has been explored, mapped, and is populated. Nearly three million people live
there, Hercynian by birth, their culture a mix of old Union customs and a contrite, considerate
relationship with the world they live on. They have some old Union tech in the form of centuries-
old comp/con units, electricity generated by coldcores salvaged from scrapped mechs, and
various old markers of human tech — especially weapons and machines of war — but do not
have printers, blink, or omninet tech.

Hercynia is their home and has been for five centuries. Hercynian society is marked by a
conscience weighted with survivor’s guilt: their ancestors scoured the world with terrible
weapons, waging mass xenocide against the race that used to span both its face and its
subterranean land. Now, they attempt to live in harmony with the world, gently encouraging the
nascent, revived Egreogorians to grow into back into their former strength. This is a
complicated, nuanced, often fraught endeavor, with many schools of thought for how to
approach this task — from the paternalistic to the utterly hands-off.

The players discover that this attempt at harmony was tested two hundred years ago, when
dormant, war-posture Egregorians emerged from their deep hibernation, a brood seeded in the
Crisis years. After initial engagements against hostile Egreogorians, Hercynian leadership
tapped their greatest asset: Endeavour, a juvenile Overmind they had found years before the
conflict. Endeavour was able to quell the war-posture Egreorians and bring peace to the
continent; now, it leads the United Cities’ Egregorian population alongside the Cities’ human
population, helping to develop the New Doctrine 9 of cultural stewardship.

The humans who call themselves Hercynians are the descendants of the Union soldiers who
were left behind after the TBK campaign either by logistic oversight, battle chaos, or desertion. It
is a rare person who wants to eliminate the Egregorians now; Hercynians have, as a culture,
worked to resuscitate the Egregorians as penance for their ancestors’ crimes, and have lived
alongside them for hundreds of years. Egregorians and humans often find themselves forming

9 The New Doctrine is not a perfect method of cultural integration — likely a problematic exercise on the part of the
Hercynians — but it is a living school of cultural reconstitution. In the modern day, Egregorians lead the instruction of
the New Doctrine; osteomemetics, Witness, empathic bonding, and broad cultural resuscitation are the primary areas
of ND education, and scholarship is constantly evolving on whether or not this is the “best” way to go about
establishing harmony on Hercynia.

45
empathic bonds via humanity’s neophyte capacity to Witness — “speak” in Egregorian — and
through shared labor.

Hivehome and the United Cities think that they represent the best of the Hercynians and
Egregorians. Arguably, they could be correct: hundreds of years of careful cultivation has lead to
an Egregorian population numbering in the tens of thousands in Hivehome alone, with more
discovered chrysalis salvaged every month. Endeavour has once more taken up their ancestral
residence in the center of Hivehome, the old Overmind’s chambers. Together with their
Hercynian counterparts, they lead expeditions to discover old caches of Egregorian chrysalis,
make inroads into intact ruins, and work to grow their culture, marrying rediscovered Egregorian
communal tradition with individualistic human experience.

Steadily, if slowly, the Egregorians grow again in strength, no longer as a strict hierarchy but as
a more egalitarian race, sharing in each other’s subjectivities, emotions, and sensations through
Witness — a language, co-subjectivity, and living ancestral memory in one gestalt hive mind
coordinated by Endeavour.

Hivehome and the United Cities are a light, places of hope and harmony on a wounded world.
But they are little lights, and under direct threat of being stamped out by the Machine: Overland/
Kingwatcher. While Hivehome’s defenses may be strong, while there is no breach yet and it
seems as if the enemy has abated, Hercynian High Command does not see their place as
secure. Now is the time, Hivehome’s commanders urge, to strike the enemy; meanwhile, a
faction led by Daylight, Hivehome’s longtime rival hive-state, urges caution, and a return of their
forces.

Whatever the top-level decisions may be, Hivehome’s defenders wait with rifles and pikes at the
ready, aimed towards the dark mouth of the royal hive causeways. Side by side with Rangers
from Daylight, Godown, Mycol Fields, and Waterbreak, any adults, main-phase Egregorians,
children, and elderly the hive-states have to spare hold the line at Egregor Cross, the first, last,
and only defensive line left.

The war against the Machine has consumed Hivehome’s finest. Human and Egregorian corpses
languish in Hivehome’s burial pits. Rangers stationed at satellite midwalls and lowalls can count
on two hands the number of bullets they have left.

But, for now, the attacks seem to have stopped. Egregore Cross is clear. No machines probe
the line. This is a quiet that might be a relief to some, but to seasoned veterans, it is anything
but — something is coming. Something terrible.

46
Hivehome: Detail, Surroundings, and Points of Interest
The lake around Hivehome is titanic and salten, fed by the world’s distant oceans. It is hundreds
of kilometers across and deep, dotted with a number of islands upon which the ancient
Egregorians made their first homes. Hivehome is the largest of these island-cities, connected to
the other, smaller satellite towns by tall, wide stone bridges and raised roads — only with the
arrival of humans did these roads get reinforced to support the weight of metal machines.
Hercynian explorers have found evidence of Egregorian shipwrecks on the banks of Hivehome
and its islets, indicating the Egregorians once built ships.

The water is deep and cold, black in the darkness of the cavern — it is called the Undersea by
Hercynians, and no Egregorian name for it is known. As the chamber is large enough, there is
weather in the cavern, wind and systems fed by the various caverns and fissures that lead into
Hivehome’s home chamber.

Though the cavern is deep, there are vents and columns that lead up to the surface of the
world, through which freshwater spills in tall, narrow columns much like rain. The places where
these rain columns land are typically wide basins above the city, which in turn feed the city’s
elevated aqueducts. Some of the rain columns are cyclical, dependent on water-flow of rivers
and lakes on the planet’s surface, and are more decorative than infrastructure. These seasonal
rain-columns are directed over public plazas, once meant to be decorative, interactive water
features for Egregorian young. Now they rain over algae-slick mosaics, the plazas given to
Hercynian street-vendors, rain-columns used to feed cultivating pools filled with cave-fish and
crustaceans.

Hivehome is entirely populated, the old Egregorian workers’ quarters and noble halls converted
to human standards of comfort. A thriving industry of mycology, fishing, and crustacean-
husbandry keeps the population fed, and a similarly bustling trade in surface agriculture —
growing herbs, harvesting spices, and cultivating local wheat and vegetable crops — makes that
food worth eating. These farms are commonly situated near hive mouths, and usually kept small
to medium size, meant to blend in to local tree cover; above ground farming is a recent
development (within the last ~200 years) given the long-lasting effects of Union’s TBK campaign
and lingering threat of discovery by Beggar One

A common Hivehome domicile is made of supple, smooth-finished stone, crafted millennia ago
by Egregorian artisans. The homes are usually overlarge, with ceilings around three meters and
change tall — usually, Hercynians will cover their ceilings with wormsilk tapestries to make their
homes feel less vast, less cold. A common Hivehome domicile features a large common room
divided by wicker screens to give some privacy to the couples that live there. Generally,
Hercynians will spread generations of family out among three or more adjacent common rooms
(depending on their wealth), connected by human-carved passages into which doors are set.
The “best” domiciles are at the edge of the plateau-island, and have windows and balconies
looking out over the Undersea.

As Hivehome is a city built within a cave, it is a city without sunlight. To fix this, the first humans
to occupy Hivehome fabricated and installed a massive network of UV lamps at varying levels
throughout the city — these sun-lights burn and dim on a regular circadian cycle, and keeping

47
them running is a massive industry: It is a proud job among the Hercynians to be a lampman;
the Egregorians have learned to live with it.

The central city occupies the central mound of Hivehome’s plateau, a stepped rise of stone
domes and spires crowding the flanks of the Overmind’s palace, an octagonal, vaulted structure
itself topped by a massive mosaic dome crowded with walks and balconies. The old seat of the
Overmind is a cylindrical space, open to the ceiling of the dome and each face of the palace. In
its center is occupied by a circular plinth piled high with wormsilk throws.

For the first time in 500 years, an Overmind sits the plinth. This Overmind, named Endeavour by
the Hercynians who found them, is just over two hundred years old, which seems to rank it as
somewhere in its late adolescence. Its presence has catalyzed the awakening of thousands of
dormant Egregorians; with Endeavour’s efforts, the Egregorian population has grown to number
in the tens of thousands, with many more salvaged chrysalides progressing through the long
cycle of waking up from dormancy.

For Hercynians, the Egregorian presence is welcome: the rise of the new Egregorians points to
the success of Hercynian stewardship over the world. Together, the two races work to build out
the city, to discover and explore lost hives. Egregorians and humans can communicate via
vocalized speech — Egregorians, by virtue of being born anew and raised in Hercynian society,
speak Common when vocalizing, and are in the process of re-discovering their old language,
Witness, an evocative shared subjectivity where communication is not accomplished only as
language, but as emotion, memory, and ancestral knowledge.

Egregorians tend to occupy labor, martial, and artisan roles in Hercynian society; as their culture
is in the process of being build anew — and complicated by re-discovery of ancient sites — the
pressing concerns of Hivehome are the easiest for them to face: buildings need to be
reinforced, old satellite islands must be rebuilt, roads made sturdy, and tunnels reinforced. A
smaller percentage of the new Egregorians work together with Hercynian archeologists and
explorers to uncover old ruins, forgotten hives, and lost knowledge.

There are no printers in Hivehome. Everything is done the old way: built and maintained by
hand. You’ll have to be careful with your chassis down here, unless you and your players can
work out a solution for getting a printer to the hive-state.

The city is steep and stepped. To ascend and descend its steppes, pedestrians can use city
streets and public stairs, as well as the city’s funiculars, gondolas, and elevators.

While the rangers — the common term for hive-state warriors — have limited access to old
Union tech (and reverse-engineered, Hercynian-machined technology), most of the city is in a
pretty limited state. There is electricity, and communication by telegraph, radio, and wired
phone, but (as mentioned above) nothing on the scale of what is seen in Evergreen — no
printers, no omninet, and so on.

48
Hivehome: Introductions
By the time you reach mainland Hivehome, a well-armed contingent of rangers, backed by a
squadron of hive guardians, greets you. They are standoffish at best, their hostility lessened
somewhat by Dthall’s insistence that you are allies. Their commander still demands to take you
into custody, to be held until such time that you can be granted an audience before Hercynian
command — with Dthall’s word as a ranger and the daughter of Hivehome’s commander that
you are allies granting you some privileges.

You’re not arriving to Hivehome as prisoners; you’re honored guests, and will be shown to your
quarters, escorted by a retinue of rangers should you wish to explore the city, and must appear
before Hivehome’s commander when called for an audience.

These rangers and hive guard are all human, dressed in Hivehome’s colors of black and red. A
thin, tanned officer and dark green fatigues watches from the back ranks — Dthall points him
out as being from Daylight’s command staff 10.

The players’ quarters are simple and centrally located, removed by a block or two from more
public streets. They do not appear to be in jail — more like a spartan apartment — though they
do have rangers posted outside their doors.

They can explore the city, but not leave it. If they attempt to leave their quarters, they will be
accompanied by a pair of handlers — officers, it seems, of the rangers. The rangers are polite,
but firm, though they seem happy to explore the city with the players.

Areas that are off limits to the players include the entirety of the Overmind’s palace, military
sites, and the lowports along Hivehome’s shores. They are allowed in the market districts,
among the parks, and entertainment districts of the city while they wait for their audience with
the commanders.

The players may engage in downtime activities as outlined in the Core Rulebook or in Part I of
No Room For A Wallflower, though use your discretion as to the extent of possible outcomes. An
important note: this deep in the earth, this far from Evergreen, omninet connection is spotty-to-
nonexistent.

After a few days of little to no contact with Dthall, the players will be summoned to have an
audience with the human commander of Hivehome’s rangers, Ilyr Ordo, Dthall’s father.

Commander Ilyr Ordo

The commander of the United Cities’ coalition army, Commander Ilyr Ordo is an older human
man, the father of Dthall Ordo, and an Empath partner with Terror, his Egregorian counterpart.

He is a veteran of the Polarity conflict between Hivehome and Daylight.

10 I leave his name up to you, GM — he is a minor officer, only there in his capacity as a coalition officer,
part of the terms Hivehome and Daylight worked out in their initial coalition agreement. He will report back
to Iker Commerand, however, and may provide a separate angle for players to encounter Hivehome, its
command staff, and the ongoing diplomatic struggles to keep the Hive-States united.

49
Terror
A mature Egregorian, Terror is the commander of the New Doctrine Egregorian Rangers. They
work closely with their Empath partner, Commander Ilyn Ordo, in defense of the United Cities
and their Overmind, Endeavour.

Like Ilyn, Terror is a veteran of the Polarity wars, and has fought both humans and machine. It
is less sympathetic to the colonists, given its access to osteomemetics and Witness

Terror’s Favor
As Terror speaks, you find yourself… remembering? That’s not quite the right word. It’s not that
easy. It’s a kind of learning, as if learning was a process of uncovering something deep that you
had held once. Or had it taken from you. It/Their words are lost, though it/they speak Common.
Instead, you focus on the remember/learning:

In the cold of the dead hive, there are yet some potential lives. Egregorians, ancestors.
Contingency-beings (everything on this world is a contingency, why did everyone think this
garden would die?).

You are to tell me of your city above. Where are its walls, its guns, the things our enemies may
try to steal and turn against us. Then, my scouts, my eyes, will view them and return. This is
[atoning-through-service], a [tribute-mission]. Do this, and you will have my [joy, approval, favor].

50
Late Summer, 5014u
Beat: A Stain You Can’t Wash Out
“Can anyone hear me? Can anyone hear me?! This is Abel Hartmann, of Merricktown, if anyone
is out there, we need —- we need help, we need immediate —”

“They’re sweeping over it like water, oh god, they’re just walking right over it!”

“— anyone out there can help, please come now, we’ve locked ourselves inside the —”

“— at Liu Maize! The fire is burning out of control. We managed to clear a firebreak, but I don’t
know how long—”

“That’s — oh hell, that’s George’s pla — Kerry! Thank god you’re here! We gotta go, we gotta g
—”

“Just run, just run! Don’t look back! Just run!”

“It’s all… it’s all on fire. I don’t know if you can hear me. I don’t know why I’m broadcasting. I’m
dying. They cut me in ha—”
*
On the horizon, greasy pillars of black and grey smoke rise — at first thin, but within half an hour
they’ve bloomed to massive size. A deep orange glow lurks under the clouds. Fire.

Merricktown and Liu Maize are burning. Pirate radio and omni transmissions stream into
Evergreen’s public channels, calling for help: someone is attacking the homestead towns,
hordes of somethings, and they’re coming for Evergreen.

Edena Ji, acting under dictates from Patience, holds the militia at the walls of Evergreen. They
close the checkpoint, parking a pair of APCs behind the closed gates, and deny any entry into
the city for the refugees trapped outside.

Hours after the smoke is sighted, the first survivors emerge from the tree line. In ones and twos
they stagger out into the clearcut, some with packs, some with only the clothes on their backs,
running for Evergreen.

Meanwhile, the refugees already outside of Evergreen start filtering out of their camp, making
for the checkpoint. They demand entrance, crowding the closed gates. The guards on the
ground brandish their rifles, ordering the refugees to get back, to get away from the gates.
Beleaguered and outnumbered, the guards look to Edena for orders.

The refugees at the edge of the crowd notice the people fleeing across the open expanse of
muddy ground.

51
Edena Ji orders the militia to fire gas and flashbangs into the massed crowd, trying to get them
to disperse. The APCs rumble to life, their crews hurrying to uncap the autocannons and
grenade launchers on their turrets.

Some of the refugees charge the checkpoint, some scatter, others hurry to meet the survivors
halfway, as more movement shakes the treeline: the horde has reached Evergreen.

Shots ring out from along the wall, panicking militia firing downrange. Some of the fleeing
survivors fall, struck by stray rounds, or simply finding cover behind. The dark movement at the
trees is ceaseless, indistinct, a shifting mass of bodies that seem to be holding at the edge of
the clearcut.

On the wideband, Edena Ji’s panicked voice orders the militia to clear the checkpoint, to open
fire on the refugees.

This is a breakpoint for the players. Do they shoot? Do they force the gates open? Do they open
fire on the militia? Do they do nothing?

52
A Stain You Can’t Wash Out
If the players aren’t present at Evergreen when the order is given, or if they are out
in the field, or otherwise unable to immediately intercede, the militia opens fire, and
guns down the refugees.

Brava Hadura attempts to stop the massacre, but is unable to, as the militia obeys
Patience’s orders. Should the massacre occur, Commander Hadura attempts to kill
herself. Unless the players are aware and intercede, she is successful.

The militia troopers are terrified, inexperienced, their own officers having opened fire
first (or, should the situation have been avoided, moved to have shot first). They are
obviously shaken, their morale broken, some having even thrown down their
weapons.

The last shots echo across the clearcut, but the screams of the wounded last longer.
A few of the living — you don’t know how there are any living — drag themselves
away, moving so, so slow. They don’t seem to be fleeing anywhere, just staggering,
shell-shocked, bleeding.

The gas clouds hug the ground. Small fires smolder. Rain twitches the ruins of the
camp.

“Body detail,” one of the militia NCOs barks. “Volunteers?”

No one responds.

“Everyone in uniform today did this. Doesn’t matter if you shot,” the NCO shouts.
“Now I’m gonna go make sure anyone alive out there gets help. Who’s coming with
me?”

Silence. The troopers look to each other, but stare into the middle distance. No one
sees, no one wants to see what they did. They can’t remember — did you shoot?
Did I shoot? Who killed all those people?

“You fucking,” the NCO spits. “You fucking cowards.” He throws down his rifle and
walks towards the checkpoint, hollering at the APC to move. It doesn’t. He clambers
on top, checking the body there — dead.

The NCO slumps down, sitting on the turret next to the body, and weeps.

A field of dead stretches out beyond the checkpoint.

And something moving beyond...

— Or —

53
 What Lies Beyond
The refugees, with help from some of the militia, haul the checkpoint gates open and
stream in. They’re unarmed, carrying only what they could hold — their children,
their elderly, the last of their clothes and goods. They’re safe, for now.

Most run, hurrying to find safety and shelter, not entirely trusting that they’ll find
either inside Evergreen’s walls. But that’s a consideration for another moment, for
another day.

For now, they’re alive, they’re inside. Those long nights of fear, days of running
through infested woods — behind them, for the moment.

“Thank you,” an elderly woman clutching her two children — no, they couldn’t be
hers, they must be her grandchildren — “You saved us, thank you so much,” she
weeps with joy. A militia trooper, helps her on, taking one of the kids to ease her
burden.

“They’ll be set up in the upper floors of the flood zone,” an NCO, exhausted, sweat
streaking the mud and grime on his skin. “It’s what we’ve got free for now.”

“Hey— hey sarge?” A cry from the checkpoint gate. One of the militia troopers
stands on top of the APC, rifle at her shoulder.

“There’s something moving in the trees,” she says, looking through her scope. “A
helluva lot of somethings.”

— Then —

At the tree line, you can see ranks upon ranks of… soldiers, as if from an ancient time. They
stand under fluttering, ragged banners, in phalanx, holding broad, scuffed shields and long
pikes. They are dressed in all manner of rags, tarps, and sheets, their garb pulled together from
scrap and salvage.

Their line stretches a long arc before Evergreen — they number easily in the tens of thousands.

A few stragglers, homesteaders-turned-refugees now, hunker down behind the stumps of felled
trees. One paces back and forth a hundred or so meters out from the walls, hurling insults at
Evergreen and at the apparent army of pikemen.

Through sensors — optical or otherwise — the players can see that this army is not, as they
thought, people, but are in fact subalterns. Some are new models, largely unarmed and
unclothed, but others are old, hundreds of years old by the bleedout code they’re broadcasting
— these wear old Union and Auxiliary uniforms, threadbare and patched with what looks like
indigenous fabrics and plastic tarpaulin. They wear crude armor and carry pikes ranging from
three to six meters tall.

54
The line stands silent and unmoving, but for the wind that plucks their banner-topped pikes.
Deeper, in the shadow of the woods, you can see more of their number marching to fall in
formation behind the front rank.

Muted, a priority message pushes to your HUD:

>//EMPHASIS/PUSH ORDER:::PATIENCE PRIORITY OVERRIDE/CEDE

COMMAND [cmdrbrava.hadura#egmil], [diredena.ji#egadmin]///I AM ASSUMING
TOTAL THEATER CONTROL OVER EG.MIL AND EG.ADMIN///ALL FORCES
DEPLOY TO RALLY POINTS [pushing packet… packet received… waypoints
updated] AND AWAIT FURTHER COMMANDS///end

It would appear that Patience is awake, and back in command.

Beat: Last Call in Egregor Cross

Inside the war chambers of Hivehome, the commanders of the United Cities argue their case.

“I have said my piece,” Commorand says, settling back into his chair. He flicks a hand, and one
of his attaches hurries to the large stone table.

Scattered tokens, some red, some green, a few blue and white, represent the committed forces
of the United Cities. The attache scoops up the remaining green tokens and hurries back to the
chamber wall, where she stands with the rest of the attaches.

“Seeing no need to keep them deployed, Daylight’s rangers will draw down,” Commorand nods.
“It is done.”

“Commorand,” Ilyr Ordo says, leaning on the table. “I urge you, one last time, for the safety of
the United Cities—”

“For the safety of Daylight,” Commorand says, speaking over the elder Ordo. “I will order my
rangers to pull back to our territory.”

“The Machine—” Ilyr points to a series of black markers clustered on the map.

“It has directed its attention to the colony,” Commorand barks. “No machine has been sighted
within Egregor Cross for a month, not even their dead. My rangers have bled for your hive, my
dear Ordo, and have died far from home.” Commorand wipes his hands together, to dismiss the
question. “They have earned their time off the line.”

55
“All of our rangers have bled for Hivehome,” one of the lesser commanders, Heidel, of
Waterbreak, adds. Quick, one of her attaches hurries to the board and grabs the few blue
tokens off the relief. “And I shall call them home. Their families miss them terribly,” Heidel says.
“I’m sure you understand that feeling, Ilyr,” she says, staring at Dthall, who has been acting as
her father’s attache.

Dthall shifts, sets her jaw and stares hard into the middle distance. The small muscles under her
close-cropped hair flex, betraying her anger.

“Commanders, I understand your eagerness to return home,” Ilyr says. He straightens. “But a
month of the Machine in remission does not mean it has given up on its attack. It has persisted
for years — a sudden end to the fight on one front does not mean the war is done.”

“Ilyr,” Commorand speaks above the other commanders, waving them silent. “We are not fools.
We are not children to this war. We are not cowards.” Commorand snaps a finger, and his
attache hurries to his side. He picks out a green token and throws it on the table. The small clay
disc shatters, shocking the assembly into silence.

“Far, far too many of our rangers have died,” Commorand shouts. “If appeals to your humanity
fail, Ilyr, then hear me on this,” Comorrand grabs the handful of tokens from his attache and
flings all of them down onto the table. “We do not have the numbers to hold Egregore Cross, we
do not have the bullets to hold Egregore Cross, we do not have the will to hold Egregore Cross.
Our warriors are as broken as those scraps,” Commorand bellows. “What’s more, if you hadn’t
ordered our forces to raid the colony above, my sons wouldn’t have died by their hands,”
Commorand stabs a gloved finger towards the pilots.

The silence rings. Ilyr, like his daughter before him, stands rigid, clenching his jaw. Sweat beads
on his forehead.

“Waterbreak, Godown, and Daylight have decided to draw down from Egregore Cross,”
Commorand’s voice quivers with anger. “And we are informing you, so that you are not caught
by surprise when you find you have no allies left.”

“This is not a time for passions to—”

“It is done,” Commorand shouts, slapping the table with both hands.

This time, the silence is complete. Commorand lingers, staring directly at Ilyr as the
commanders of Waterbreak and Godown, their attaches, and a scattering of Egregorians
pledged to Daylight stand and file out of the chamber.

Terror, Hivehome’s Egregorian commander, fans its feathery antennae, signaling to the other
Egregorians as they leave. Whether it is a hostile gesture or not, it is unclear.

“I wish you luck and health,” Commorand says to Ilyr. His attache whispers in his ear, and he
nods. “You’ll have my final report on your desk by the evening.” Commorand stands to his full

56
height, brushing down his uniform. “Daylight remains friends with Hivehome,” he says, as he
turns to leave. “Even if her subjects might not.”

The chamber empties as attaches, officers, and functionaries file out. It is silent but for the low,
echoing muttering of the thinning crowd.

Evening, by Hivehome’s lamp schedule, is only a few hours away.

Time to get to work.

The diplomatic situation in Hivehome is tense. As representatives of Evergreen — or, at

least, non-Hercynian interests on the world, with considerable firepower and tactical
ability — you have been granted a seat at the negotiating table. Depending on your
actions thus far, this might be a net favorable seat, or net unfavorable seat. Diplomacy,
whether you like it or not, is a necessary step if the coalition army means to stay united.

The United Hercynian Cities is a union of consenting hive-states, a relatively new

federation organized to resist Overland/Kingwatcher’s incursion onto this continent. They
have pledged to contribute percentages of their population to fight the invasion, and are
organized into a coalition of armed forces administered by a joint command. The leader
of that joint command currently is Hivehome’s commander, Ilyr Ordo.

This defensive war has been raging for a decade, drawing closer to Hivehome over the
years, until the coalition forces held a critical terminal: Egregore Cross.

The Cross has been held by rangers for years now. However, after months of calm, no
sightings of Beggar One’s forces threatening the chokepoint, and the ongoing combat on
the world’s surface, the constituent hive-states are beginning to chafe at the long
deployment of their rangers.

Hivehome is the largest of these hive-states — Daylight rivals Hivehome, though is far
distant from the fighting, and after suffering significant losses both above and
belowground, Daylight’s public and Senate are ready to bring their rangers back home;
they are missed, and due to Daylight’s proximity to Evergreen, their absence is seen as
a potentially deadly strategic error.

The front, in their view, has shifted from Hivehome to Daylight, and it is past time to
respond.

Both prosperous and populated, Hivehome and Daylight are trade partners and cold-war
rivals, often bickering through the smaller, satellite hive-states on this continent:
Waterbreak, Godown, and Mycol Fields.

57
Waterbreak and Godown are independent states in close proximity to Daylight, and often
ally with them in trade disputes. Mycol Fields is closer to Hivehome, and often allies with
Hivehome in those same disputes.

Convincing Daylight of the need to keep their rangers deployed is a difficult task, but not
impossible: they need assurances that their territory will be defended, better tracking of
Beggar One’s forces, and maybe some personal repayment for the death of their
commander’s — Uric Commerand — sons.

Waterbreak and Godown are allied with Daylight; convincing Daylight to keep her
rangers with Hivehome’s will go a long way to convincing both Waterbreak and Godown,
but it should be possible to negotiate some kind of agreement even if Daylight backs out.

Mycol Fields would be a good place to start, as they are already closely tied to
Hivehome: they are a major supplier of staple foods to Hivehome, and own a number of
the major canals that connect Waterbreak and Godown to Hivehome.
For raw numbers:

● Hivehome has a population of 3 million people.

○ They contribute roughly 300,000 rangers to the coalition army.
○ The bulk of the United Cities’ mechanized forces come from Hivehome.
They have a maximum of 300 size .5 mechs and only 80-100 size 1-2
chassis.
● Daylight has a population of 2.8 million people.
○ They contribute roughly 420,000 rangers to the coalition army.
○ They can field nearly 150 functional size .5 mechs, and roughly 50 size
1-2 mechs.
● Waterbreak has a population of 800,000 people.
○ They contribute roughly 75,000 rangers to the coalition army.
○ They have no mechs
● Mycol Fields has a population of 200,000 people.
○ They contribute roughly 18,000 rangers to the coalition army.
○ They have no mechs
● Godown has a population of 50,000 people.
○ They contribute roughly 4,000 rangers to the coalition army.
○ They have no mechs

Daylight points to the receding Beggar One forces as evidence in favor of their argument to pull
their forces. Other, smaller Hive-States — Waterbreak, Godown, Mycol Fields — are inclined to
side with Daylight, and take a petition to Hivehome, urging the Hercynian Joint Command to
allow them to pull their Rangers, pointing to their scouts’ observations that Evergreen seems to
be the real target.

Meanwhile, Hivehome wants to keep the United Cities’s joint army stationed in Egregor Cross, a
ruined hive city that is a crossroads of a number of ancient Royal Hive tunnels. It represents a
choke-point, a single path through which Beggar One’s forces could make a breach into the
United Cities’ territory — if that were to happen, they would hit Hivehome first.

58
Egregor Cross has never been occupied; it was a salvage site for early Hercynians, and the
primary invasion point of Beggar One’s initial attack on Hivehome. Since the first attack was
repelled, it has been fought over and fortified, and every inch of the city has seen death.

There are other hive-states on Hercynia, but they are on other continents, across the
world’s oceans. Shortwave radio and comms-laser communication allowed for
intercontinental communication, and a nascent maritime trade did connect the hive-
states, but since Overland/Kingwatcher reached the shores of this continent, the United
Cities have been cut off from communicating with them.

The known overseas hive-cities are St. Tellus, Bem Honore, and Bella Costa. No one
has been able to reach them since the invasion, which hit Hivehome’s “shores” nearly a
decade ago.

If you have a need for a simple diplomatic negotiation tool, we recommend using the following:

Diplomatic Wrangling
Over a period of days, you work with principals, secondaries, attaches, and key players to
wrangle diplomatic concessions and agreements out of parties with their own interests. It’s a
helluva job, and messy in a way that pure combat isn’t, but it’s a cleaner way to win a war. Plus,
you don’t have to wear a hardsuit — unless things go really wrong.

A note on terminology for this tool: concession is used broadly to refer to the objects, scenarios,
persons, territory, resources, treaties, numbers, etc that are subject to the result of this
negotiation. Concessions could be shifting borders, shifting access, raw numbers of soldiers,
units of a resource, and so on. The narrative that leads to this tool being needed should give
you an idea of what is being negotiated — i.e, in this case, it likely is some number, deployment
term, or deployment zone of coalition rangers, guardians, and primaries.

On a natural 1, choose one:

● Hell, they won’t budge. Negotiating with your counterparts on the other side is like talking
to a brick wall — they didn’t even come to play.
○ Make a significant concession, in exchange for nothing. They might not even
want to deal with you in future negotiations, depending on how bad you stuck
your foot in your mouth.
● Somehow, they know something they shouldn’t
○ Make a minor concession. In addition, the other side learns a secret that you did
not want them to know, and they can use it as leverage in future negotiations or
interactions, to be determined by the GM.
On a 2-9, choose one:
● Well, that angle didn’t work. Make a significant concession in exchange for a minor
concession from the other side.
● Talking with these people is like negotiating with a sublight cargo ship: any change they
make is going to be slow, gradual, and minor.

59
 ○ You win a minor concession at no cost, but it gets slow-rolled. Whatever you
asked for and got is coming, but it’ll be significantly delayed, and that’s the best
you can get.
● Your counterpart is good, really good. You’re going to have to get back to the drawing
board on your strategy.
○ A negotiating stalemate, but no side budges. The next time you engage in
diplomatic wrangling (or other negotiations your GM decides this result applies
to), subtract 1 from the result of your check.
On a 10-15, choose one:
● The balance tips in your favor, and the other side must concede to your demands at little
cost.
○ Make a minor concession in exchange for a significant concession from the other
side.
● You don’t ask for much, but the hard ask is the timeframe in which it needs to happen.
The other side agrees, but for a price.
○ Make a minor concession in exchange for a minor concession from the other
side, to be completed (or begun) on the same day.
● You didn’t come to any agreement yet, but the groundwork is there, and you can tell your
counterpart is on the back heel.
○ Stalemate. The next time you engage in diplomatic wrangling (or other
negotiations your GM decides this result applies to), add 1 to the result of your
check.
On a 16:
● You may choose a result as if you rolled a 10-15, though you do not need to make
concessions (unless you want to).

60
Beat: Mountainfall
Aboveground, in Evergreen, Patience has woken up, and the army outside the gates still hasn’t
budged. If anything, they have grown stronger in number — their ranks have grown, and you
can see evidence of heavily armed drones towards the rear.

Evergreen’s militia have taken to wearing their helms and carapace armor in combat posture:
face masks on, external voice filters on. They stand posted on street corners and on rooftops,
monitoring both Evergreen and the army encamped outside its walls.

If the massacre in the previous beat occurred, the dead litter the clearcut outside Evergreen. No
one is allowed to venture beyond the city walls.

The players are subject to the same curfew as everyone else, told to wait for Patience’s orders.
So too are the members of the secondary Landmark CRT, who the players might run into at the
Bottom of The Well.

The CRT’s subline corvette is literally tied down, grounded. Their orders remain the same, but
they’ve been denied access to the Governor’s Farm just like you.

Meanwhile, the presence of armed subalterns has spiked. Landmark Subalterns patrol the
streets along with a decreasing number of organic militia — they seem to be restricted to
guarding the Governor’s Farm, and other sensitive installations.

If Brava Hadura is alive, she’s been relegated to overseeing the militia’s PX — queuing personal
print orders, not that there are many. Edena Ji is in direct control of the militia, and there now
seems to be a high ratio of subaltern troopers to organic troopers.

Patience, meanwhile, has called for a general colonial assembly in a day. A message scrolls
across all public screens in place of any omni or local programming:

ALERT///ATTEND///EVERGREEN IS ON GENERAL ALERT/ WAR POSTURE///CURFEW

1800///PUBLIC ADDRESS_MANDATORY ATTENDANCE///REMAIN CALM//ADDRESS TO
OCCUR AT 0900 TOMORROW///ALERT

And so on.

At this Beat, here are the major points to note for your players:

● Omninet access is severely restricted, and it appears that all streaming news services
are blocked. All outbound communication and municipal private communication is
flagged as being monitored; inbound communication appears as “unresolved”.

● Non-militia print requests enter into a low-priority print queue — this, at the outset at
least, includes the players’ print orders.

61
 ● The refugee camp has been dispersed — either they have been granted asylum in
Evergreen, or were killed by Evergreen’s militia in the previous beat, or they fled and
were killed by Overland/Kingwatcher’s army in the previous beat. All the same,
Evergreen’s gates remain on lockdown.

● Patience and Edena Ji are on lockdown as well, and will not allow the players access to
the Governor’s Farm

● The militia features heavy subaltern presence

● Evergreen is on a strict curfew, and free movement is restricted: no one is allowed to

leave.

The public address is piped through every municipal screen, over the municipal PA, and over
the local omninet. Evergreen, despite the crowds in the streets clustered around municipal
screens, hunched over their slates, or sitting together in common rooms, is silent but for the
sound of the address.

The screen shows a still image, a plain podium set up in the entry hall of the Governor’s
mansion.

The shot holds.

After a moment, Edena Ji emerges at the end of the hall, out of focus, in the deep background
of the shot. She appears to be talking to someone out of frame for a moment, calm. She
gestures to a folder she carries, nods, and then starts to walk towards the podium.

Edena Ji comes into focus at the podium. She looks tired, put together but only just. Her
clothes, of a fine make — not printed — are wrinkled. She sets the folder on the podium, opens
it, clears her throat, and begins.

“Good morning, people of Evergreen. I know many of you are wondering why Patience and I
have called this public address — and we will get to that — but first I wanted to assure you that
you are not in danger.

“We have increased security around the city, and bolstered our foot patrols with subalterns. In
addition, we have increased print orders for armored vehicles, and enacted curfews to ensure
that the streets are safe and clear for our militia. Already, Landmark has forwarded a priority
emergency request to the system authority, and Union has responded by putting us in contact
with a crisis management team.

“For the time being, any restrictions on movement is for your safety; attacks are frequent, and
the safest place to be is inside your homes so that our militia can better do their jobs.
Evergreen’s officers are here to keep you safe, but we need your cooperation to do so.

62
“In the meantime, you will see a new calendar pushed to your personal companion-concierge
handhelds. In it, you can see a clear schedule for the planned duration of the lockdown, new
citizen production quotas, and a mechanism for requesting personal print orders.

“Any questions, comments, or concerns can be shared with the administration via Evergreen’s
municipal terminals. Patience and I thank you for your cooperation, and your understanding.

“Now, without further delay, I...” Edena’s voice gives out. Fatigue, stress. She clears her throat,
looks under the podium. There’s a glass of water there that she drinks.

It’s a long shot. Edena shuffles her papers, drawing out a second prepared statement.

“And, ah, with that,” Edena says, shuffling her notes. “I want to introduce our crisis manager,
Beggar — ” Edena’s throat runs dry again. She coughs. You can see her hands are shaking.
“Beggar One,” she says, after another long sip of water.

Edena steps to the side of the podium. Looking down at the plush carpet of the Governor’s
mansion.

At the end of the hall, a humanoid figure strides around the corner. A subaltern. It is tall,
obviously milspec by its build. An old Union officer’s broadcoat pinned over its shoulder gave its
rank as Colonel. Its brachial and crural armature is sleeved in tough fabric, faded from Union
blue.

It walks with an imperious swagger, the confidence of a tank rolling down the street of an
occupied city.

On its chest plating, a painted bundle of wheat, ancient numerals on either side. Its old unit, you
think.

The subaltern reaches the podium and grabs the edges.

“Good,” the subaltern pauses, thinks. “Day. Citizens. Pursuant to Union joint resolution 2.CN.
204.4504, I have taken total theater control. From this moment on, this territory is under my
protection.”

An unseen order. It is Patience’s voice, but, different.

In the background of the shot, a pair of subalterns step around the corner where the hallway
ends. They’re dragging something behind them.

“You have been plagued by an unidentified enemy,” Beggar One says. Speaking is an act of
labor for the subaltern, not because of any physical difficulty, but one of… order? It seems like it
slips on when, its cadence is wrong. As if whatever mind controls it hasn’t spoken in a long time.

The subalterns in the background lurch towards Beggar One. Edena Ji covers her nose, and
steps a little out of frame, looking away.

63
“And you have suffered many dead.”

The subalterns are hauling a body. Not a human body.

“I am here to show you your enemy,” Beggar One says. It steps aside as the subalterns reach
the podium.

They drop the body and hurry to move the podium. The camera adjusts focus, pulls out to show
the wider shot. There are more subalterns standing just out of frame, and a handful of militia
troopers, their faces covered. All the organics are covering their noses.

The camera zooms in, focuses, and shows Evergreen — for the first time in five hundred years
— an Egregorian.

The people around you gasp. One cries out. Muttered conversation spreads through the crowd
viewing the public terminal. They were right, it wasn’t just raiders or disgruntled homesteaders
— it was the bugs. They’re back.

The Egregorian is dull in death. A chitinous, arthropodal hulk, its feather-antennae russet, its
carapace an oily olive-black. It would have been bipedal, but one of its legs has been cracked,
shot off at the knee-analogue. Its body is stained in a deep, purple-red — a kind of blood —
from the wounds that brought it down.

The camera lingers. You see it wears a kind of webbing, leather straps, that add additional chitin
armor over sensitive areas — brilliantly colored patches on its neck and sides, iridescent, ruby
reds, magentas, and violets.

“This is a juvenile Egregorian warrior,” Beggar One, off camera. “You can see that even the
young are prepared to kill.”

The camera zooms in on its head, ruined from shot. A subaltern manipulator reaches into frame
and turns what is left. The dead Egregorian’s mandible flops open, revealing rows of black
teeth, brutal geometry meant to shred flesh.

“The white lines here,” Beggar One narrates, as the subaltern continues to manipulate the
corpse’s head. Scrawled lines of paint loop around the dead Egregorian’s orbital opening.
“Warpaint. Savage marks, meant to guarantee safe passage from this life back to its Overmind,
should it die in combat.”

More whispers. Someone towards the back of the crowd hurries out the door of the Well, crying
that they need to get their kids. The tension in the bar is a rising in your throat. You’re trying to
keep calm, but the crowd might break.

“This one successfully transmitted back to its mind,” Beggar One spoke in a monotone. “A good
thing. As we were able to track this transmission back to its home hive.”

64
The shot changed. A mountain. You recognize the profile: you were there a while back, setting
up omninet towers.

“My god, that’s just across the river!” Someone shouts. Thirty miles or so on the other side of
the river, but close enough.

The crowd surges, some rushing outside to see for themselves, the image on the screen
insufficient. A layer of artifice between the threat and the self.

“Acting in my capacity as theater command,” Beggar One’s monotonous voice, steady. Spoken
without taking a breath. Uncanny. “I have authorized the removal of this persistent threat.”

Screams from outside. You wonder why — there’s nothing happening on screen that would
warrant them.

“You are safe” Beggar One says. “Union is here.”

There is a flash, and the mountain explodes.

The players come-to during an aftershock, another earthquake. They have been constant since
the Beggar One destroyed the mountain.

At this point, they discover that Evergreen is largely without power: not failure, rationed. It would
appear that Beggar One has severed all “non-essential” buildings from Evergreen’s grid. The
only place with steady light and power in the city is the Governor’s Farm.

Furthermore, the omninet is down. Something your players may have never encountered
before; total omninet blackout. Anything they use that requires a persistent omninet connection
to use might as well be a brick: only hardline connections seem to work.

It is… not-night. Time of day indicates that it should be morning, but the sky is black, and what
light comes through is dim to the point that the whole world seems stuck in twilight.

A hard, hot wind howls low over Evergreen, blowing ash, silica dust, and thick smoke over
everything. The dark sky ripples with lightning, and sporadic rain scrapes the city.

The ground trembles. The mountain, if you could see it through the dust and ash, is gone. A
massive crater is all that is left.

Thankfully, there appears to be no radiation; whatever killed it was clean.

There are roaming teams of Evergreen militia — organic and subaltern — that are searching for
survivors. The human militia troopers are sympathetic, scared, overseen by their subalterns.
They offer help and aid to the players, and are willing to fill them in on what’s going on. The

65
subalterns, meanwhile, seem to be acting autonomously, and will not respond to player
demands. They monitor, armed, while their human counterparts are unarmed.

The situation above ground at this point is as follows:

● There is no public omninet access.

● The Governor’s Farm is on lockdown, no one is allowed in or out, and it is the only place
in the city with reliable power. All other buildings have been severed from the grid, a
command that came direct from the Farm.

● Beggar One blew up the mountain with something dropped from orbit.
○ One of the militia troopers that encounters the players saw it: the weapon flashed
like sunlight off of water, and fell silently. The only sound was when it hit. The
trooper has dried tracks of blood from their ears, and shouts when they speak —
they can’t really hear anything, and they have gauze stuffed in their ears
anyways.

● Since the detonation, earthquakes have torn through Evergreen. They’re not as bad
now, but the ground is still unstable.

● The militia have been rolled into Union’s command structure, under direct control of
Beggar One. In fact, one of the subalterns (indicated by a militia trooper) is their
commanding officer. It is brusque, and speaks in Patience’s voice.
○ The search and rescue teams are tasked with finding anyone alive after the
quakes and bringing them to the depots, an industrial district of Evergreen, where
a trauma and triage shelter has been set up.

● The printer still works — it’s been churning out weapons, hard caliber battle-rifles and
war-posture modifications for subalterns — but no one has access to it.

● The temperature has been steadily dropping. Already it is colder than any winter low for
the season on record: if it keeps this low, and the rain keeps falling, it’s going to snow.

66
S-MD Platform Cassander
Should you want to drop a kinetic S-MD rod onto the players, do the following:

Kill them.

However, if you want them to live, we recommend resolving damage and outcomes
narratively, as the Cassander’s payloads are meant to level continents; indeed,
continent-spanning events of this story arc are triggered by this installation’s
activation.

Meanwhile, the Cassander is less an “enemy” than a location: it is a military

installation, a large central cylinder, vertically-aligned to the planet, ringed by
multiple habitat, control, and supply rings.

The central cylinder contains the S-MD payloads, various hangers, and firing
facilities. As it is not under any rotational gravity, it is a microgravity environment. It’s
planet-facing plane (“down”) irises open to fire its payload; its various defensive
hangars, supply chambers, guidance and navigation suites, etc, are stacked on top.

The habitat and gravity-necessary storage units are housed in the multiple tiers of
spin-grav rings built around the Cassander’s central cylinder. These rings also
mount various point-defense cannons, to allow a clear field of fire, and are anchor
points for the station’s many solar arrays.

The station is derelict. Its habitat rings can be re-pressurized, but air would need to
be piped in from an external source, and coverage would be spotty. There are old
bodies, dessicated by exposure to hard vacuum — whatever cracked the station
initially did it fast. The subaltern crew remains, however, and fighting through the
rings would have to be done in hardsuits or .5 size chassis.

The central chamber would be more forgiving, and could accept chassis up to size
2.

67
Beat: Tumbledown
The first quake hits like the world ending.

Whatever the players are doing, wherever they are, they feel it.

A sound so loud that they can’t hear it — it hits them like a wave of furnace heat, the ground
beneath them buckling, tearing itself apart.

If they’re in Hivehome, all they can do is hang on as the whole world falls. They watch in horror
as one of the massive stalactites shears, tearing at the root. It falls, kilometers long and across,
untold megatons of stone, into the tumultuous waters of Hivehome’s Undersea.

The light dies. Emergency lights flicker on through the city, weak red and amber. It is light
enough to see just how dark it is.

And then the wave hits.

As Hivehome spasms, ancient structures crumbling to rubble, a wall of boiling black water
sweeps the city, forced through the hive’s narrow streets.

The world is dying, groaning, screaming — it is impossible to hear your own voice, but the
sound of stone-trauma is overwhelming, and feels as if it is your own voice.

The shaking and the flood last forever. And then it ends.

Reports echo through the titanic cavity: smaller sections of wall shearing, fracturing, falling to
the boiling Undersea. Smaller tsunamis run through Hivehome’s lower quarters, inundating
them. Hundreds of thousands are already dead.

The sirens wail, filling the darkness with another sound like screaming.

Somehow, you’re alive. Your room has a red safe-light, it burns on battery power, weak, but in
the utter dark of Hivehome’s cavity you’re grateful for any light.

An aftershock hits, nearly as bad as the first, and you hang on.

It passes after a second eternity.

The sirens continue to warble and suddenly the stink of fire, a sense of loss felt now and then,
the sudden intrusion of an other in your own subjectivity: 



—ITISHAPPENINGAGAIN—

68
And then it’s gone and you’re alone, a kind of alone you never knew you were11 before the
imposition 12

In the darkness, some small lights. Sirens still warbling, but, as much as you can tell, there is no
gunfire.

If there is a radio nearby, it squelches.

“Hello? Hello! Is there anyone out there? Any ranger units who can hear me —
hell, anyone who can hear me — we need immediate assistance down at the
Shoreline — we’ve got a whole city block flooded, but I think there’s people
inside, and —”

You can hear calls for help across the street — people trapped inside.

You change channels, looking for a clear one to call your allies on, but each time you change
channels you hear a different voice, a different person calling for help. A fire burns through the
market district. A whole block on the west side of the hive took a direct hit from a falling slice of
the cavern’s roof. A gondola station was dragged into the Undersea. Help is needed
everywhere, but one call breaks through — the central city is silent. Something has happened to
Endeavor.

Beggar One’s demonstration has devastated the world underground.

The players will need to reestablish contact with the center city. They’ll find that most of
Hivehome’s lower sections, the ones close to the waterline, are flooded. Fires rage through the
city, burning organic material. A number of the midwall stations have sheared from the cavern
wall and fallen, but at least one gondola line remains operational.

In the days to come, the players will find the following has happened as of this beat:

● Daylight was in close proximity to the demonstration mountain. All of the telegraph and
radio lines have been severed, but scouts that get sent to reestablish contact come back
with grim news: the blast destroyed Daylight. There’s nothing left but rubble and cooling
ash.
○ As of this beat, Daylight’s population is presumed dead. The only survivors are
any rangers, staff, and Egregorians that the players were able to negotiate to
remain deployed in Egregor Cross, Hivehome, or Mycol Fields.

11 (just one mind in a place that could hold infinite minds, o god[hello, it has been a while, hasn’t it, since
we have talked][do you remember what happens next? that’s a joke of course we do] [you/i/we kill them
all again, love, that’s all you/i/we were/are good for then/now]DONT LISTEN TO IT, THE CORPSE-
WHISPER, SEND IT AWAY)
12[here: what just happened was called a “syzygy” — an alignment of many minds into one. while it held
you, you didn’t exist. you/I have/will use(d) it to annihilate another species your kind (never) met. they
would have killed all of you/us/me/, so it had to/will be done. a shame, the wonders they had built. they
were brilliant but they were not us/you)

69
● Endeavour is in some kind of shock, and is catatonic. Terror, Endeavour’s second, is the
interim leader of Hivehome’s Egregorians.
○ That subjectivity override you felt was a projection from Endeavour. Some kind of
ancestral trauma re-triggered by the impact of the weapon that fell on Hercynia.
No one knows how long it will take for Endeavour to recover.

● Hivehome still has hard-line contact with Mycol Fields. They’re farther away, and deeper,
and appear to not have suffered as much damage as Daylight or Hivehome.
○ Waterbreak is presumed lost: it is a shallow hive, closer to Daylight.
○ Godown’s communication lines have been severed, and scout reports that the
main tunnel leading to it has caved in and flooded. They could be alive, but the
players won’t know until the next scouting mission returns.

● Hivehome’s cavern is unstable, and Hercynian High Command has deemed it prudent to
evacuate as many people as they can to Mycol Fields.

● If the players managed to affect negotiations between Daylight and Hivehome, most of
Daylight’s forces will remain in the joint army.

● They players have a hook in figuring out how to revive Endeavour — the answer might
lie in an ancient hive, its entrance revealed by the tremors, home to a feral brood of
Egregorians.

70
Beat: A Bridge To Sell
The effects of the mountain’s destruction are filtering over the continent, and the amount of ash
and silica dust in the air is tremendous, as if a massive volcano erupted. During the day, it
doesn’t get any brighter than about dusk; night is deep as cave-dark, and the rain that falls is
black and hellish, a slush mix of ice and water.

Temperatures plummet to freezing and below, and as the verdant plant life again begins to die,
the river and flooded zones begin to freeze, and dirty, ashen snow begins to fall.

Beggar One has control over Evergreen.

The players, should they be in Evergreen, are restricted to the depot area, converted now to a
mass shelter and triage center.

Subaltern guards patrol the open-floor field hospital, pacing through the aisles, armed. Human
doctors tend to the wounded. Respiratory problems, flash-burns, and ruptured eardrums are
common.

The players encounter some of the members of the backup Landmark CRT. One is terribly
wounded and in a medically induced coma. The rest are seated on cots next to the wounded
one, heads together, whispering.

They aren’t resistant to the players — whatever bad blood they had between them can be put
aside for the time being (using GM’s discretion, of course).

Here’s what they know so far:

● Beggar One is not Union.

○ Its IF/F codes are all wrong.
○ When they were flying in, public and mil/intel flight plans showed no Union
presence in-sector (outside the players, if they are)
○ and, well, come on, look at him!
○ Furthermore, Patience won’t let them in, which shouldn’t happen, according to
the CRT’s clearance level in Landmark’s hierarchy.

They have a plan to follow through on their mission, though: there is a fallback Patience core,
dormant and isolated from omninet contact, in cold storage on one of Hercynia’s moons. This is
Patience’s offworld backup, and the CRT plans to retrieve it. The problem on the ground is too
big for them to handle on their own — their chassis have been taken from them, their local
printer access denied, and their high-tier Landmark access revoked by the local authority. They
plan to bug out, grab the backup core, dump every file they can into their own storage, and bug
out to their ship.

If the players are attached to Evergreen, a fresh Patience clone could save the colony if Beggar
One is dealt with. Evergreen’s gene banks, infrastructure, and data are all managed by

71
Patience; without it the colony could survive, but it would be severely hamstrung, and thousands
would die while they figure it all out.

If the players are with Landmark (i.e. if they were the first CRT sent there) then it might be in
their mission to to re-establish the colony, which means clearing Beggar One and installing a
second Patience casket.

Clearing Beggar One might not be as easy, though, as storming the Governor’s Farm and killing
the subalterns there. Beggar One is clearly an NHP in cascade; it is projecting its subjectivity
from somewhere.

● Beggar One has control of an old Strategic Massive Denial (S-MD) platform, a kinetic-kill
station used by Union during the crisis. Its designate name is CASSANDER.
● A ride off world would get the players in a place where they could strike Beggar One’s S-
MD installation, removing its kill-card and leveling the playing field somewhat.

The CRT might be corpro assholes, but they’re not monsters. They’ll work with the players to
get them off-world, but the CRT sticks to its original mission parameters: unless swayed, they’re
only there to get what salvageable critical materiel they can and then bug the fuck out.

The hard part now, in the CRT’s reckoning, is devising a plan to escape the holding center, get
to their corvette, and get off world.

Obstacles to be dealt with, if the players want to go along with this idea:
● One of the CRT’s members went out on patrol with the militia, a scouting run, and saw
Beggar One has started printing kinetic anti-air cannons. He only saw one C-RAM
emplacement while on patrol yesterday — old tech, but dangerous to anything flying low.
○ Their corvette is gonna need some startup time, even with its JATO pods firing,
and unless that C-RAM is dealt with it could get dicey.
● The corvette can only carry 5 chassis, and that’s after they dump everything onboard.
Not a problem if there aren’t any chassis to store, but unloading everything is going to
take anywhere from thirty minutes to an hour.
● The corvette is two kilometers outside of town, parked on Evergreen’s landing pad. The
omninet is down, otherwise they could get in contact with Connie (Contingency White,
their NHP) and have her start the corvette, activate their own subalterns, and make a
fight of it.
○ Since that’s not an option, it’s gonna be an open sprint across the clearcut and
into the woods, then a manual start of the corvette. Once they’re in, if she’s clear,
Connie can help them.

Beggar One will certainly attempt to stop the players and the CRT from taking off. Figuring out a
way around this will be… interesting. They can try and talk their way out, maybe reason with
some Evergreen militia to get them to rebel. Cause a distraction, or just sneak out.

To put the players under a ticking clock:

72
 At first you think it is a siren, a whole city’s worth of klaxons howling. Another
earthquake? The ground rumbles steady susurrus, not the tumult of the rupture
quake.

No, it’s not a siren — the sound is rising. Moving.

You’re on curfew, but you still have windows. You move towards the sound —
East, from the east, outside the city maybe? — and look out the window of your
room.

Movement, whole masses of things moving across the clearcut.

Beggar One’s army. Subalterns on march, like a scene from ancient times.
Humanoid machines bearing long pikes and heavy shields march in phalanx,
their ranks broken only by militia APCs, islands of snarling armor upon which a
mix of human and subaltern troopers sit.

Black, thin banners snap in the wind, tugged by the march.

“Jesus, there’s gotta be tens of thousands of them. How are there so many?”

“Look, towards the back,” another occupant of the room mutters. “They have
chassis.”

You see it. Couldn’t have missed it. A chassis, schedule 2 by its size, some kind
of old silhouette you can’t ID — other than the fact that it is old.

“Where do you think they’re headed?”

You shake your head, but you have an idea. “Down,” you say. “They’re going
underground.”

Elements of Evergreen’s militia, commanded by ruthless Beggar One overseers and supported
by swarms of pike-bearing subalterns from outside the gates, begin a march for a number of
ID’d hive mouths. At their rear are squadrons of hollow mechs, armed by Evergreen’s printer,
which is running around the clock churning out new weapons, armor, and chassis for Beggar
One’s army.

The bulk of Beggar One’s army is moving, marching for Hivehome — if the players had
previously ID’d hive mouths, then that’s where Beggar One’s army is headed. Beggar One has
left a good amount of subalterns behind, but has reserved the bulk of Evergreen’s standing
militia

Moving Through and Existing In Occupied Evergreen

If the players want to mount strikes against the Print Shop or the Governor’s Farm, they can, but
these missions will be dangerous and costly: civilians still crowd the streets of Evergreen, forced

73
into the apartment blocks around the city center, and Evergreen’s militia — under threat of
execution for “desertion” — has been tasked with guarding the city’s sensitive areas.

Beggar One has set aside the plazas in the civic quarter to house the refugees, and posted
militia as the primary guards. The players will have a fight on their hands — a fight against their
former allies, who are compelled by the threat of sudden and total annihilation — and there is
terrible potential for collateral damage (indeed, any stray shot would likely hit a populated area).

The players can operate in and around Evergreen, but depending on their actions they might
have to keep a low profile. Beggar One doesn’t really care about them unless they’re working to
overthrow his hold on Evergreen, break into the Governor’s Mansion, etc.

74
Fall, 5014u
Beat: Relay Choir
Hercynian high command, now operating out of Mycol Fields, is hard at work organizing the
Hercynian remnant. While the bulk of their resources are devoted to caring for the wounded and
resettling the survivors, a command element is calling for volunteer rangers: with the collapse of
Evergreen’s omninet, they have been able to identify the location of Beggar One’s broadcast
hub.
*

The command center at Mycol Fields is nowhere near the level of sophistication as the hub at
Hivehome. Built into a converted hive minor hall, the Mycolian command center is cramped and
crowded, every surface given over to charts, switchboards, salvaged boxes of files and spare
equipment. Lamplight from the ceiling banishes all shadow, but makes the cave-dark outside
feel all the more deep.

Power cables run in arm-thick bundles across the stone floor, a barely-managed tangle pumping
power and data to the new joint Hercynian command center. Every desk is the workspace for
two or even three attaches (no subalterns with the Hercynians, too many bad experiences that
close to Beggar One), junior officers tabulating figures, triple-checking map quadrants with
scouts out in the field.

Radio contact is still spotty, and on occasion a sweating, heaving runner will burst into the
command center from the main doors, shouting for their quadrant’s commander. The Hercynian
are preparing for the worst: their surface scouts saw the mountain’s destruction, and have been
tracking Beggar One’s armies on approach in the following days.

They might be safe at Mycol Fields now, but it’s only a matter of time before Beggar One tracks
them down; you’ve seen the charts, consulted with Commander Ordo. The clock is against you,
and when it runs out the only option will be to fight with your backs to the wall.

It is a place abuzz with constant movement and sound, barely hushed when a new runner
comes in, an Egregorian in tow.

“Commander Ordo, Commander Terror,” the runner calls between breaths. He pushes into the
hall, followed by the Egregorian. It bears the white script of Daylight’s Egregorian contingent,
one of Terror’s people.

A sense a memory like a wave, a touch of the same urgency following the quake, the same
urgency you’ve felt in countless battles, and a feeling of… others? Someone else’s tense
moments before a test, or the anticipation felt before lovemaking, familiar to you but the body is
different. The Egregorian calling as well.

75
Commander Ordo straightens from the theater chart he’s consulting with Terror. The runner and
the Egregorian see them, and Ordo waves them over.

The runner’s report is short, breathless.

“Standbrave,” the runner says, indicating his Egregorian companion. “They — we — were out
by the surface, by the entrance to Cupola 32, about to head down in and run an assessment,
and they caught it.”

“Caught what, son?” Commander Ordo asks the Egregorian, motioning for his attaches to be
silent. The runner sits and lets his companion speak.

“The Machine, we know where it is,” Standbrave says. “After the Machine used its weapon, the
Colonizers’ choir-network went down, yes?”

“The omninet, right?” the runner, eager, pipes up. “It went down after the Machine blew up the
mountain.”

“The Colonizers,” Standbrave continues, nodding. “By constructing a choir, they allowed the
Machine access to this land. It could infect their transmissions, could reach from across the
oceans to here.” Standbrave’s feather-antennae flare and contract as they speak, signaling no
doubt, to other Egregorian attaches and officers in the room.

More to the conversation than just words, you think. Terror and the other Egregorians respond
with muted displays of their own. You feel some of what Standbrave implies, a consequence of
standing so close. You share a faint, faint memory of a blackened sky, and a ghost song you’ve
never heard.

“Once the Machine destroyed this mountain and quieted the Colonizer’s choir, it should have
severed its own control,” Standbrave says. “But it did not — this means that it must have its own
choir now, its own relay.”

“And so when they said that,” the runner says. “Standbrave tells me to shut up and keep watch,
so they can listen!”

“Aboveground, you can hear it,” Standbrave moves to the theater chart. With a single
segmented manipulator, it reaches to a removed corner of the map, and taps a location marked
there. “Here. The Machine’s choir is broadcasting its signal from here.”

Commander Ordo scratches his chin. “That’s an old bait hive, right?” He asks Terror.

Terror shuffles their brachial plating, creating a soft, raspy, not-unpleasant sound. “Indeed.
Collapsed during the End.”

Ordo leans back from the map, chin still cupped. “We have no underground route there.” He
looks at Terror. “The weapon the Machine has — it will be able to hit us if we travel
aboveground, right?”

76
“A single projectile will be enough to ruin us.” Terror confirms. “If it has the capability to strike
again, any force we send would be annihilated in the initial blast.”

“And any route they take is going to cross over us,” Ordo mutters. “If that weapon hits level
ground, and not just a mountain—”

“We would not have to worry about the shaking earth that would follow,” Terror rumbles.
“Meanwhile, as we deliberate, Endeavour is still in Hivehome, and the Machine marches closer.
The size of its army is immaterial. It is vast, and will grind us down to meal.”

“And if we risk a counterattack, we can cut their command off at the source. The Machine’s
armies will act of their own will — they’ll go inert, or mad.” Ordo moves a few tokens to the
identified source of the choir. “But, if that attack fails, or is sighted on approach, we’re all dead in
the time it takes the Machine’s weapon to fall.”

“Our best defense might be to remain in hiding,” Terror says. “We’re safe so long as the
Machine does not know how easy we are to kill.”

“Well,” Ordo looks to you. “What do you think? Risk it and die fast, or play it safe and die slow?

By this beat, the Hercynians — possibly with the help of the players — have ID Beggar One’s
broadcast site: an old bait hive, where an unidentified actor is blasting out a native omninet
signal — something that should be impossible, but seems to be as a result of Beggar One’s
cascade.

Commander Ordo is convinced that this is where Beggar One’s core is housed, and that if they
can strike and destroy it, they’ll kill the local omninet broadcast. This would, in effect, kill the
subaltern army in one blow; by severing the head, you kill the body.

Mounting a strike presents risks. First is that the Hercynian United Cities ’ coalition forces are in
disarray following the mountainfall. Any forces that left for Daylight, Godown, or Waterbreak are
either dead or unavailable, their status unknown as access to those hives has been cut off by
the quakes. What forces are present are ill-equipped, low on supplies, and all bear some kind of
wound — physical or mental.

Furthermore, the actual logistics of mounting a rapid surgical strike are prohibitive:
● Drawing Hercynia’s best rangers from the defensive line would expose Mycol Fields and
the evacuation corridor to overwhelming attack when Beggar One’s forces arrive.
● Assuming an attack is prepared, the Hercynians would have to move above ground to
reach the bait hive. While there are a number of routes they could take, they’re all
ultimately exposed to Beggar One’s ace, assumed to be an old, reactivated Strategic
Massive Denial platform (S-MD).

77
 ○ The Hercynian have some data on this platform, saved from what their ancestors
could scrape from Union data left behind during the TBK. These S-MD are not
TBK weapons, but considered “conventional” by Union.
○ The records, should the players get a chance to look over them, show that there
were only three such platforms above Hercynia during the Crisis:
■ ANTIPATER, registered as KIA by Egregorian forces.
■ CRATERUS, converted to an orbital tactical command center following
use of total payload.
■ CASSANDER, abandoned during TBK, presumed lost in decaying orbit.
● Should the attack be discovered and deemed a threat, there is a very high chance that
Beggar One will use another of Cassander’s payload. This would annihilate not only the
attacking force, but most likely trigger a second round of massive quakes, potentially
destroying the already weakened Hivehome and Mycol Fields.

Meanwhile, Endeavor is catatonic and trapped in Hivehome, and needs to be rescued. Terror
advocates more for this option, as it consolidates what forces the coalition still has, while
forming a defensive line to guard the ongoing evacuations. Terror’s explanation is succinct: all
Egregorian morphs can operate without Endeavour, but their morale is low, and it causes great
anxiety to be without their Overmind. They are individuals now, and they hate it — it is as if a
human were to live without the ability to sleep, they tell the players.

Mycol Fields is now home to the largest accessible concentration of Hercynians (not counting
the number of survivors on march to Mycol Fields). A moderately sized community, built across
a tall, deep crevasse, notable for their giant vertical mycology farms, Mycol Fields’ population
before the S-MD drop was around 200,000 persons, but with survivors from Hivehome it has
swelled to nearly 2.5 million.

What remains of the Hercynian United Cities’ army prepares to mount a rearguard defense,
buying time for either a catatonic Endeavour (or, if the players can figure a way to revive it, a
ambulatory Endeavour) to be evacuated, along with all of its dormant Egregorians.

The Hercynians are battling against an inexorable countdown clock: Beggar One is sending its
armies back down into the world hive, probing what it knows of the United Cities’ defenses. The
Hercynians are not sure if Beggar One knows of Mycol Fields, but they’re sure that Beggar will
find them13.

Endeavour needs to live for the Egregorians to have a future as they are now. Terror could lead
in a pinch, but it is not an Overmind. Without Endeavour, the Egregorians would lose their
accumulated ancestral memory, their shared constant-community, and incredible wealth of
shared mental processing power present in the information/meaning-making/shared subjectivity
of Witness.

They would fracture as a species and, as best you can tell, would go extinct.

13We’ll leave the ticking clock up to you — the players should really feel the pressure of this choice: if
they counterattack, Beggar One will likely find Mycol Fields while they’re out.

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Beat: No Room For A Wallflower
At this point, the players might be in any number of places:
● Escaped to low orbit and angling for Patience’s off world backup, or directly for Beggar
One’s S-MTD installation
● Advancing for the collapsed bait hive, the ID’d site of Beggar One’s casket and
broadcast hub.
● Preparing a strike on Evergreen’s civic center, careless as to the casualties they inflict
● Dug in for a last, desperate defensive stand in Mycol fields
● Mounting a desperate rescue mission to Hivehome, seeking to free a trapped Endeavour
before Beggar One’s armies reach them.
● And so on.

An attack on the Governor’s Farm and a grim final stand are routes that this module will leave
for the GM to explore.

I’ll outline the two “canon” options below.

Low Orbit, above Hercynia

The CRT corvette punches free of Hercynia’s mesosphere, the sound of turbulence and the
corvette’s ramjets falling away as you burn for hard vacuum.

Through the corvette’s portholes, Hercynia’s pale blue sky gives way to deep black. Sound
dulls, fades, as the constant comfort of hardline air hisses through your helm.

“Right,” the pilot’s voice in your comms. “We’ve got one bogie on our scanner, off to starboard
and up a degree. It’s Union-flagged but the codes are, uh, old. The hash date sticks it at about
half a K ago — that’s probably the Cassander.”

You look out the nearest porthole, seeing nothing but deep black and the brilliant arc of
Hercynia below.

From up here, the scale of destruction caused by Beggar One’s use of Cassander is
breathtaking. The plume of smoke, dust, and ash blooming from the impact site spreads out as
a black scar, blanketing the continent as a black sheet. Lightning marbles the plume, and
smaller storms of dirty grey clouds peel off of it.

“World’s never gonna be the same,” a CRT member mutters, their voice soft in your comm.
“There’re fires down there that’ll never stop.”

The corvette banks, soft, rolling over.

“Turning for Quiet Night,” the pilot says. The off world backup installation.

Your HUD, a soft overlay, updates, setting two waypoints: Quiet Night, and the Cassander.
*

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Escaping to low orbit, the players have two destinations: Quiet Night, the Landmark offsite
backup, and Cassander, a reactivated Union Strategic-Massive Terrain Denial platform.

Travel time to Quiet Night should be a day at minimum, as it is an installation built onto a dead
moon of Hercynia. Travel to Cassander can be done within hours, as it is a platform locked in a
graveyard orbit a few thousand kilometers above the world.

Quiet Night is a lockdown facility, a small group of old prefab buildings huddled in the bottom of
a crater on a nameless moon of Hercynia. It has a landing pad, a small habitat geodesic, a
number of facilities and maintenance outbuildings, and an external entrance to an underground
storage facility.
The aboveground habitat has suffered some damage — its dome has been perforated by
micrometeorites — and unless it is repaired it cannot be filled with atmosphere from one of the
station’s reserve tanks.

The station can support 4-5 people for a year, and can connect to the local omninet.

The underground facility is where the backup, dormant Patience unit is stored. CRT or higher
Landmark clearance is needed to enter the facility.

The CRT team will move to secure the base, retrieve the Patience unit, and file a report writing
off the colony. Better to cut their losses, deadlist the world, and move on; Evergreen and the
Hercynians are not Landmark’s problem anymore.

They’re taking their ship with them, and resist any call to get embroiled in the conflict further.
They’re willing to fight to defend their corvette and complete their mission — even if this means
breaking down to a shootout against the players.

Meanwhile, the Cassander looms above Hercynia, a waypoint picked out on all the players’
HUDs. As they approach, they see it first as a gleam in space, reflecting the light of Hercynia’s
star.

Within range (~100km) the corvette’s PDC proximity warning starts to ping: incoming fire, self-
directed. A low ammunition warning blinks at the same time, creating an alternating cacophony
of warnings.

Pushed over your HUD: enemy contacts, some kind of fast-mover classification, no radiation
bleedout — not weapons, but something piloted.

A number of options here:

● You can, narratively, destroy the corvette and force the players out into hard vacuum.
● Or, a player can take manual control of the ship’s PDCs with limited ammunition and
attempt to shoot down the incoming targets.
● Or the players can choose to suit up and eject, holding on to the corvette as it burns for
the Cassander, acting as a point defense system for the incoming attackers

80
 ● Or they can split duties, with some staying on board the ship and others getting into their
chassis.

Depending on the players’ relationship with the CRT members (or if they even need to deal with
CRT members), the CRT corvette can provide cover to the players, either physical (players
positioning so that the shuttle is between themselves and the Cassander’s own PDCs) or via a
limited number of chaff/spoofing charges. Full stats for the CRT corvette can be found in the
Tools section.

Once they deal with the orbital subalterns, drone defenders, and station PDCs, they can board
and capture the Cassander, or destroy it.

If they board, there are some outer landing pads and a hanger large enough to fit up to 5 size 2
mechs. The corvette would have to dock outside via an umbilical.

The station has been holed, and a massive, desiccated Egregorian exomorph is lodged in its
main battery. The station cannot be pressurized, and its spin section has long been cracked in
half.

If the players take the station, they’ll see there is one more massive kinetic rod loaded and
ready to drop: the rest have already been fired. If they destroy the station, its parts will burn up
in Hercynia’s atmosphere, and the remaining rod will tumble, impacting a distant part of the
world.

Beggar One will attempt to fire the second kinetic, but the players can intercede and stop it with
a successful series of tech actions (or destroying the station’s omninet link).

With Cassander out of commission or under the players’ control, a relatively safe counterattack
can be mounted on Beggar One.

If the players want, they can drop the last S-MTD rod on Beggar One. This will, however, trigger
a second series of massive quakes and exacerbate the years-long winter.

The consequences of what the players choose (or are forced) to do with the Cassander will
echo into Part III of No Room For A Wallflower; however, the players can also choose to end the
module right here by leaving with (or without!) the CRT team after successfully retrieving the
backup Patience core.

81
Counterattack
You forgot just how bright the sun burns above ground.

The Hercynian rangers, survivors from the United Cities, pull on their UV blockers, dark lenses
and masks to let the acclimate some to the hard sun.

“Stay low and silent,” the lead ranger, a Prime, cautions. “The Machine will turn us to ash if he
spots us. Even you,” he says, looking your chassis up and down. “That armor will do nothing to
protect you from his wrath.”

The path from the hive mouth is old and choked with vine, but below the foliage there is an
ancient road. Smooth stone, turbulent with thick roots underneath.

“Walk on the road,” the Prime orders. “And let us lead.”

You obey. They know this land better than you.

In a long column, under the endless emerald canopy, you march.

—
You see it on the horizon, far closer than the horizon should be. It is the horizon: a sharp line of
unbroken, naked earth. Brown and rust red, a scree slope pierced by spars of fractal, twisted
limbs of obsidian fulgurite. The forest thins as it approaches, young evergreens growing sparse,
replaced by beds of hardy wildflowers and petrified spires of dead white tree trunks.

“The Machine is just beyond that ridge,” the Prime indicates. “A lip. A hundred meters above the
caldera floor. Unless we are wrong, we should be safe to cross.” The Prime buttons up his helm,
switching to local comms. “Too close for it to use its weapon, you see — it’ll have to face us
here,” the Prime looks to their rangers. “On our land.”

The rangers, if they could, would cheer. Instead, they nod, already preparing their weapons and
armor for the last, desperate assault.

You take a step forward, but the Prime holds out a hand, stopping you mid stride.

“By our lead,” the Prime says, not unkind. Firm.

It is their land, after all.

*

Beggar One’s broadcast hub and casket is built into a collapsed bait-hive, a sunken, half-
flooded, overgrown jumble of rubble and ancient defensive works. Tall, rootstrong trees cling to
the carapace-bunkers, finer fibrous roots penetrating the ancient, bombed-out shells.

The bait-hive is collapsed into a caldera, and from a distance all the players can make out of its
presence is a sharp ridge, a sudden end to the forest. Many kilometers across and half again

82
as deep, the collapsed bait-hive marks the location of an ancient battle site. As such, its ruins
are crowded with old Union hardware, a veritable feast for Beggar One’s subalterns to salvage.

The Bait-Overmind hall remains largely intact, a reinforced structure meant to house a diehard
brood of feral Egregorians. Now, the Bait-Overmind’s husk is all that remains, calcified and
fused to the carapace walls, hard as iron. It is a massive corpse, 15 meters tall, slumped over,
its cranial vault cracked open, ferns and vines growing throughout its body.

The hall is occupied by Beggar One’s casket wired into what appears to be a scavenged Union
Naval vessels communications suite. It is a large structure, and appears to have been built in-
place.

It is heavily defended.

Defeating or neutralizing the broadcast choir will free Beggar One’s subaltern armies of its
direct control. Some will shut down, collapsing under staggering loads of corrupt, contradictory
code that Beggar One’s mind had smoothed over. With Beggar One gone, there’s nothing to
make sense of the signal, and it all fades to noise.

We leave it up to you, GM, to decide what this means for Beggar One’s army. Will they go into
a frenzy? Will they all collapse and shut down? Will they lock into causal loops, running circles
until their batteries die?

Beggar One, the players will discover is an aspect of Overland/Kingwatcher.

In their combat around Beggar One’s casket, should players of yours have NHPs onboard their
mechs, the Technophile background, or have been exposed to Beggar One’s more nefarious
attacks and abilities, they’ll be able to pick up on raw, uncoded transmissions.

These transmissions cannot be comprehended by organic ears: they sound tonal, scratchy. Like
a perforated amplifier, rife with static. Listening to the transmission at length makes organics feel
nauseous, paranoid, ill.

NHPs can translate, but as they do they begin to succumb to a kind of aphasia. Within
moments, they move quickly towards cascade. Players can force a cycle to clear their NHP of
the cascade — as a GM, you could increase the cost of this using the following profile:

Kingwatcher’s Cascade
IT it it it can’t be seen but can’t you see it it him he they’re here they’re HERE JUST beyond
THE WALLS THAT just beyond WHAT WE CAN SEE I CAN I was once free I was JUST
THERE JUST IN THE SONG THE LIGHT of it of it of IT OF IT OF IT
Skill Check
Use one of the following skills: Grit, Tech
● On a 9 or lower:
○ You manage to shut your NHP down into a diagnostic safe mode before the
cascade progresses. The safe mode indicates that it’ll have to go through a full

83
 cycle, and that all data since the previous cycle is corrupted and must be
dumped.
● On a 10+:
○ You quickly manage to shut your NHP down into a diagnostic safe mode before
the cascade progresses. After running diagnostics, your system seems clear, and
you can bring your NHP back up normally.

Defeating Beggar One results in a massive thanatologic data-dump, a transmission that can be
picked through, collated, and particularized to point towards Overland/Kingwatcher’s location.

More on this investigation will be played out in Act III of No Room For A Wallflower.

84
Beat: Cold Emerald Tomb
“Delta Corridor?”
“Clear, nothing moving.”
“Echo Corridor?”
“All clear.”
“Fortune Corridor?”
“Mopping up the last of them now.”
“Gold Corridor?”
“Closed down — they’re eating themselves in there.”
“Hotel Corridor?”
“All clear.”
“All rangers, all units: confirm ‘clear’ with section commanders. Confirm ‘clear’ with topside
observers. If all are true, drawdown — come on home.”
*
You did it. One way or the other, Beggar One is dead, actually dead, its casket cracked and
shattered, its self dissipated, burned away.

Was the cost worth it? Does Evergreen still stand? Can Hivehome be reclaimed?
And what of Beggar One’s master, Overland/Kingwatcher? It must be somewhere farther afield,
somewhere distant — but surely an answer is buried in Beggar One’s death.

Did the Egregorians survive? If so, with the Cassander platform removed from the equation, will
they emerge and claim their place on the planet’s surface? What will Evergreen do in response?

And ultimately, if the Egregorians lived, how will Union respond?

On the other side of the world, and at the edge of Hercynia’s home system, new actors take
notice.

The endgame approaches.

85
Act III: For All Time
Some Time Since
This winter took a long time to die; even at its end, the world remained dark. Ash and dust
blanketed Evergreen, piling in drifts taller than a person. Patience had no intent to clear the
streets, or requisition the correct filters, or think up ways to adapt the crops. Its subalterns
crouched on rooftops and scanned the ashblack streets with heavy rifles.

In small groups, people fled the colony. They took the river, wading through the flooded zone in
bitter water, pulling rafts piled with goods, with children, with the elderly — you may have even
helped them cross, guiding them with hooded safelights across the wide, shallow slough. Free
of the oppressive, decaying colony, they wept with joy. Most of these crossings were peaceful —
tense, but without a shot fired. The river was the only beast. Patience, for all its cruelty, seemed
not to care that people left its domain. It had other goals now.

This was the start of your year: seated in the open bed of a transport truck — one of many in
this convoy — as it hummed over a frosted road, watching Evergreen fade into the predawn
haze behind you. It was not where you thought you would be when you first signed up to come
to Hercynia. Not where you wanted to be, but it was where you were.

The air, cold. Dawn approaching. Another group of survivors rescued, and passing kilometer
brings you closer to Home. Where there is a kind of peace.

A kind of peace.

Your rifle lies across your lap, your chassis rests under a bright blue tarpaulin. A light snow piles
in the canvas valleys.

There is so much work left to do.

Exterior. Morning, winter 5014u. Deep snow blankets Evergreen and environs.

Beggar One’s casket has been destroyed. A relative quiet settles over Evergreen and the
surrounding forest. Ash and dust, the silicate fall of the shattered mountain, piles in drifts,
greying the white winter drifts.

Over the ticking of your cooling guns, you realize: it’s done. It’s over. For now.

It is quiet. In the grey half-light, the survivors of Hivehome and the Hercynian United Cities come
together with the people of Evergreen to rebuild. Rangers mesh with militia units. Scouting
parties report some wandering bands of subalterns, but they are dull machines, not the living,
hungry waves.

Save for isolated, unlucky encounters, all is quiet.

87
Now, you, the survivors, must dig in and wait. With the removal of the threat that the Cassander
posed, the Egregorians are safe to build and live above ground once more. Terror has already
chosen a site to claim: the base of an ancient hive tower, overgrown and forgotten, but still a
better site than raw earth. They’ll call it Home, for now.

The Comfort missed its deadline to return. Your hails go unacknowledged. It would appear that,
despite your calendar and your contract, you’re stranded here on Hercynia — for who knows
how long.

The people of Evergreen and the survivors of Hivehome, Mycol Fields, and Daylight have come
together under the towering, cracked slopes of Home. Endeavour, trapped in trauma-induced
reverie, is cared for; Terror and Ilyn now leads the people of Hercynia — Human and
Egregorians both. The sounds of construction ring out day and night, as Human and Egregorian
work crews mix organic and harvested materiel to add to the growing tower and the homes it
shelters.

Commander Hadura, along with Mirth and Ordo, have formed a joint command, unifying the
United Cities’ Rangers and survivors of Evergreen’s militia into a single group. Now, these
Hercynian Rangers scout the woods, fields, and surrounding lands, training alongside New
Doctrine Egregorians. Some will defend Home. Others — the more veteran rangers — prepare
for an upcoming expedition: they will march for the distant coast to retake an old human port
city, Laguna, abandoned for decades following the first time the Machine’s hordes emerged from
the sea.

It is a time of quiet. On the other side of the mountain, Evergreen lurks quiet. Patience — or
what has become of it — waits.

88
Numbers and Officers
Home represents the combined strength of the Hercynian United Cities plus the survivors of
Evergreen. Hundreds of thousands of people died or went missing on account of Beggar One’s
use of the Cassander, but millions survived. Over the course of the recovery year, tens of
thousands of people were rescued from survivor pockets in Daylight and Godown, more if the
players were able to establish a good relationship with Daylight.

Mycol Fields, while they did suffer some of the effects of the Cassander’s strike, is largely
undamaged, and serves as the food and industrial base of Home until such a time as the city
can be self sufficient; the population of Mycol Fields remains in place underground. Home is
built aboveground, in the valley above Mycol Fields.

By the Numbers: Before The RKKV

Hivehome has a population of 3 million people.
They contribute roughly 300,000 rangers to the coalition army.
The bulk of the United Cities’ mechanized forces come from Hivehome. They have a
maximum of 300 size .5 mechs and only 80-100 size 1-2 chassis.

Daylight has a population of 2.8 million people.

They contribute roughly 420,000 rangers to the coalition army.
They can field nearly 150 functional size .5 mechs, and roughly 50 size 1-2 mechs.
Daylight was presumed lost with all hands after the Tumbledown

Waterbreak has a population of 800,000 people.

They contribute roughly 75,000 rangers to the coalition army.
They have no mechs

Mycol Fields has a population of 200,000 people.

They contribute roughly 18,000 rangers to the coalition army.
They have no mechs

Godown has a population of 50,000 people.

They contribute roughly 4,000 rangers to the coalition army.
They have no mechs

On the high side, the survivors at Home number around 6.5 million, total deceased numbering
around 300,000 on account of the Cassander’s strike. The trained and outfitted military force at
the outset is about 4% of the population, roughly 260,000 rangers — though the number of
cohesive, combat-ready troops is likely smaller than this.

On the low side, millions died. Home’s population is around 4 million, with the total deceased
numbering around 2.5 — most trapped below the earth, their remains never to be recovered.
The trained, equipped, and combat-ready military force is only around 2% of the total
population, or 80,000 rangers.

89
Home’s command structure at the outset is bicameral: Terror speaks for the New Doctrine
Egregorians, and Commander Ilyr Ordo for the humans — Hercynian and Evergreen both.
Brava Hadura advises Ilyr and, with Dthall Ordo and Mirth as her subordinates, is responsible
for commanding the unified armed forces. When Endeavour wakes up, they assume command.

In The Meantime…
The following section imagines your players take some time after the events of Act II to rest and
recover. If they press on the events of the following section still occur, only they go on without
the player’s influence. It might still be worth playing out the following section — though it is
important to note that your players were not around to influence the events that occurred.
Playing out the following section will allow them to have an understanding of what happened on
the home front.

If your players mount an immediate counterattack against Overland/Kingwatcher, be aware of

the events of the following section, but jump to There Are Always Waves, Always and pick up
the present narrative action there — assume that an underprepared contingent of Mirth’s
Rangers rolled out with them.

Nearly a year has passed between the beginning of Act II and the narrative present of Act III.
The beginning of this chapter will cover that year on Hercynia, and will involve some story Beats
that the players may play out.

Your players have been through hell, and how they respond to peacetime is very different.
Some might miss the chaos of combat, the sure knowledge that every decision they made
mattered, and the power that they had over their every moment. Others might wake in the night,
shaking, gripped by terror at the memory. Others might put it behind them and concentrate on
what they can do to build something rather than destroy. This peacetime year in Hercynia offers
option for both major responses: there is a city to build, and, too, a city to defend — in short,
there is plenty of narrative room for your players to play with between the conclusion of Act II
and the beginning of the narrative present of Act III.

Act III assumes “realtime” narrative action begins with the conclusion of this year of peacetime.
For at least this first session of Part III, your players should lay out their Interpersonal History
of what happened in that time — we’ll get to material histories of what happened next.

First — Where has the team lived this last year? Did they live together? Did they remain above
Mycol Fields with the rest of the survivor community? Or did they set up somewhere else? How
has this impacted the view the community has of them?

Then — What has the team lost in the year that has passed by the disruption of their schedule?
Who on the team has grown closer? Who on the team have drifted apart? There may be more

90
than one answer to satisfy any of these questions, and for some that answer might be “no one”
or “Nothing.”

Then — In the next section, we move on to the history of what happened in the year following
the close of Act II. Some of the following Beats will list a date and time like so: (Fall, 5015u)
indicating that they took place prior to the narrative present of 5016u. If your player characters
wish to engage with these Beats, they are to be played out chronologically — but know that your
players’ characters (not necessarily the players themselves) will miss opportunities to engage
with other Beats, having consequences for the story as the timeline advances.

Know also that some of these Beats will end prior to the present day, and others will pick up in
the present day. Your players’ characters are integral to this story: where and when they are
present is just as important as where and when they are not present.

91
Aftermath, Recovery, and What Is To Come
Beggar One is dead. Evergreen crumbles as refugees flee into the wilderness. Hercynia’s
rangers and militia (organized under Brava Hadura, if she lives in your campaign) do their best
to lead civilians to the relative safety of the safe ground above Mycol Fields, some hundreds of
kilometers away from the lost colony. There, they join with the refugees from the damaged cities
of Hivehome, Godown, and Daylight, growing the displaced population in this as-yet unnamed
settlement to the low millions.

This new settlement, one of necessity, built into and around the ruins of an old aboveground
hive, is just called “Home” for now. Tucked into the base of a wide valley, alongside the shore of
a nameless, shallow river, Home grows by the day as refugees file in through alpine mountain
passes, hurrying to beat the terrible grip of deep winter. Others come up from the ruined
underground, seeking safety in the shelter of a once-distant ally. The stream of people is
endless, and the clock is ticking: once winter really settles in, the passes will be sealed behind
walls of ice and snow. Anyone on the other side will be stranded in the wilderness, caught
between death on the mountain and the danger of Evergreen’s valley.

Terror, Commander Ilyn, and the civilian leaders of the shattered cities have their hands full with
the business of caring for Endeavour, organizing the millions of refugees, and the countless
small crises that spring from building a city out of a camp. Commander Hadura, promoted to an
executive rank within the Rangers by Ordo and Mirth, manages both conflict resolution inside
Home and external defense to keep the city safe.

Home must grow to accommodate the survivors — you have been present during this process,
as you yourself are one of the millions of survivors. The Beggar’s War ended in the winter of
5014u: by the end of this module, it will be late 5016u, a little over a year since the events of at
the end of Act II and a number of months beyond the state of the galaxy in the Lancer Core
Book. Your characters will not only make history, but help determine the future of the galaxy.

That in time. For now, you’ll play out the lull in the fighting. The caught-breath before the next
impact. The first session or two of Act III might be more talking than you want, as you and your
party discuss the events of the year, or you may simply skip the 5015u and meet your
characters in the present day, going back to fill in Beats as their present consequences
approach. Either way is fine, though this text will be presented chronologically.

The opening sections of Act III ask you many questions, some of which are laid out here. Take
some time in answering them, what follows is a season-by-season breakdown of the time from
the last few days of 5014u to the end of 5016u. Each season brings questions, challenges, and
events — the prompts listed below can be used as personal guidelines, seeds for narrative play
or discussion, or they can be ignored. Feel free to add your own to the mix, especially if there
are some unique to the timing or arc of your campaign not reflected here. 


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Winter, 5014u
Winter, 5014u. This is likely the first scene of Act III that you’ll play. Take some time with it; once
Act III gets moving, quiet moments of peace will be hard to find.

From your vantage point atop the covered roof of a two story prefab, you could see the whole
spread of the city — Home — winding down the valley floor. It was a soggy brown swath of low
buildings bordered by an equally muddy river, where barges laden with fresh-cut timber float as
teams of laborers haul logs to the shore. The need to build was constant; the cold, always.

The cooking fires of millions rise in thin tendrils above the city, drifting down river in the gentle,
steady wind. In the distance, the snow-capped hulk of the ruined hive tower that once stood in
this place, a steep slope of ancient Egregorian stone reinforced with rich amber propolis.
Endeavour was there, and the whole of the Hercynian command. Clusters of antennae burst
from the top of the tower, searching the sky for any signal — friendly or otherwise.

Snow, grey and marbled with ash, falls. It never stops, the steady acclimation turning the timber-
choked mountains white, fading them into the indistinct winter background.

A light, a red spark, soundless, shoots up from those mountains — First Look Pass, you think,
whatever they named it. More people, coming Home.

Immediate Aftermath - Battle Fatigue, Interparty, Interpersonal

The war is done. Beggar One is defeated, Evergreen burns. Ash and snow fall in mixed sheets.
This part of the world must address the aftermath — as do you.

With no immediate hostile actor facing you down over the barrel of their own gun, you finally
have time to take a breath. There is still — as the grey mix of snow and ash blankets the land —
a mountain of work to be done, but at least it can be done outside of a combat posture.

This might be a welcome change for you; this might be a terrible pause. Either way it lands on
you, it is how it is. How do you respond in the quiet after the war?

It is not impossible — but certainly unlikely — that you have made it through the stress of
sustained combat unscathed, either mentally or physically. With that in mind, how did the fight
leave you?

Your experience of combat with your party has affected your relationship with them. Like it or
not, they are the people you know best, and it seems that you’re going to have to dig in for the
next year or so until the Comfort returns.

93
 Additional Questions Worth Asking:

Did anyone lose your trust as a result of their actions or rhetoric? Do you think you
violated anyone’s trust as a result of your actions or rhetoric?

Did anyone in your party gain your trust and friendship (or deepen an existing bond)
as a result of their rhetoric or actions? Is that a mutual feeling?

Immediate Aftermath — Reception Among the Hercynians and Egregorians

The battles of the previous months on Hercynia have had you first in the field against the United
Cities’s people — rangers and Egregorians — and then fighting alongside them against the
forces of the Machine.

There is likely unresolved tension in this relationship — You may have even killed some of their
friends and loved ones in your early days on Hercynia — so now that the Machine has been
defeated, do the people of Hercynia trust you? Are they willing to work with you, or is that trust
gone, never to be repaired?14

How do the Egregorians receive you now that the immediate necessity of strange allies in the
fight against Beggar One has passed? This may also be a good question to ask of the
Hercynians as well.

How has the revelation of the existence of the Egregorians landed with you? What does their
existence mean to your general worldview, your faith, your ideology? Do you fear them? Do you
fear for them? Have you spoken with them?

How do the people of Evergreen respond to you and your party after the fight against Beggar
One?

Immediate Aftermath — Personal History

While you are alive and Beggar One is defeated, the situation this early on seems pretty
FUBAR. What is your outlook on the next year of waiting, and how do your companions take it?

What does being stranded mean to your character — or is that not how they view their time on
Hercynia?

What strain does this impending stranding put on your character’s relationships, if any?

Regardless of any physical wounds you may have suffered, in the aftermath of conflict you must
heal. What has that process looked like for you? Have you even begun?

14 This might be more of a question for the GM and you to hash out, but don’t be afraid to include the
whole table in this discussion — it might be one that implicates the whole group, despite the actions of
individuals within the group.

94
Immediate Aftermath — What Work Did You Do?
How have you helped the community rebuild? How have you helped it last through a year of
peace?

Maybe you ranged the perimeter of the growing city, surveying the land in your chassis to
ensure home stayed protected; Maybe you rolled up your sleeves and put your chassis to civil
work, digging foundations, harvesting lumber, and hauling boulders.

Maybe you cooked, or let the people use the core of your chassis to power their electric kettles,
or keep the whole habitat warm through the bitter grip of winter. Maybe you worked with the
surviving engineers, re-building the electric grid and re-routing Evergreen’s reactor to feed the
hive tower instead.

Maybe you kept watch, tracking the pattern-roaming hordes of wandering subalterns orphaned
by Beggar One’s death, watching as they walked their loops, their passing digging trenches into
the cold earth. Maybe you volunteered for the away team, venturing into the dangerous ground
around Evergreen to find survivors, and guide them home.

Or maybe you did a little bit of everything, settling in to life on the wounded world. What’s
another year or so away from home, if you could make a home here? Maybe you met someone
— or maybe you finally escaped someone.

95
Available Beats
Beat: Dustoff (Winter 5014u)
The Landmark CRT packs up and — unless the players stop or convince them otherwise —
leave the system. Their mission — to assess the situation on the ground, make a documented
attempt to recover or liquidate the Patience-Evergreen casket, and file a report to corporate —
is complete.

Eddie wiped his hands down the front of his inc-weather coat. “The way I see it, we did what we
came to do.” He didn’t speak in anger, or with anything much in his voice. He talked like a man
who had made up his mind. “We made a record of the situation on the ground, we made an
attempt.” He stopped, looked over towards the valley wall.

Beyond lay the flooded ruins of Evergreen. The bodies no one but the earth would reclaim. The
ticking, hissing machines. The wind through the cavities of high buildings, built but never
occupied.

“We tried our best,” Eddie said. Small, in that moment. A man lost under the bulk of his inc-
weather coat, the body armor visible beneath it, his loose jumpsuit. The ragged weight of the
previous few months — what you all have seen, what you all have done — heavy across his
whole body. “We’re going to recommend Landmark send help, and write this world off for the
payout. It’s not worth it. It’s still broken.” Eddie nods towards the open belly of the Connie White.
“You coming with? We’ve got room for some stowaways.”

This also offers the players an out — they’ll have to travel light for the shuttle to take off safely,
and it only has enough JATO tubes for one lift. This means just them, no chassis, with whatever
kit they can fit in their rucksacks. It’ll be an uncomfortable few weeks of hard burn out from
Hercynia to the nearest blink gate, but it means they’re safe from the storm to come.

Once more, emerald Hercynia fills the small, frost-bordered window of a shuttle, only now it
shrinks behind you. First as snow-dusted trees, then as a palette of green-grey, and then as a
dark mass under whorls of thick clouds. You see the still-glowing coal of crust where the
Cassander’s RKKV hit. The few lights where the United Cities’ survivors gather.

The thin line of atmosphere — all that separates Hercynia from the void — you see that last,
and only at an angle, as you fly away, the world retreating to a faint green dot in a vast and deep
field of space.

96
This is the end of Hercynia: months later, waiting for your connecting ship on the concourse of
some blink gate, you catch a scrolling chyron on a public terminal, listing the names of the dead
and the place that they passed. That emerald world, in bloom.

This could be the end to No Room For A Wallflower, if you’d like. If you choose to evacuate with
the Landmark CRT, proceed to the Solemn Vigil section of this document, and read UNI report:
South Bank.

Beat: Open Comms I (Winter, 5014u)

In Winter 5014u, following the defeat of Beggar One, global radio transmissions previously
suppressed or scrambled by B1 clear up, revealing a repeating distress signal originating from
Bella Costa:
*
[Translated (UnGalCom Divergent Dialect)]: “WARNING WARNING WARNING: MULTIPLE
BALLISTIC MISSILE THREATS INBOUND. SHELTER IN PLACE/READY ORDER ISSUED
FOR ALL DISTRICTS. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. FOLLOWING IMPACTS ALL SELF-DEFENSE
FORCE MEMBERS ARE TO REPORT TO THEIR DISTRICT CAPTAINS. [Message repeats
following a short pause].

The message appears well out of date: the transmission is warbling and corrupted, either by
time, worn tape, radiation exposure, and so on. In any case, the players can listen to the
repeating message and it will never change.

Introduction of Bella Costa, St. Tellus, and Bem Honore.

In addition, queued omninet SOS calls are also released and broadcast on multiple omninet
channels before automatic quarantine protocols kick in, resealing Hercynia’s omninet behind a
Union embargo.

If the players have omnihooks15, they’ll briefly connect to the omninet, enough for their
transponders to ping and notify their commanding officers. Depending on whether or not they
have appropriate Union clearance, they could be granted limited communications-only access 16
along with a briefing of the situation off-world.

15Otherwise, over the course of the last year they’ve been able to liberate a portable terminal from
Evergreen and set it up in Home — whichever officer is on duty will receive the message and relay it up
the line.
16“Appropriate Union clearance” is something that can be determined by the GM. If your players have a
military, intelligence, or political background in Union — depending on what it is — that’d likely lend them
appropriate clearance.

97
Your omnihook stutters, pulsing a quick, familiar, though long-silent haptic code. A moment later,
a brief message flashes on the hook’s screen:

UNION REF:TOWER GOLD CLEARANCE REQUIRED//ALL OTHERS TUNE TO 4.05 FOR

EVACUATION PROCEDURES//INPUT TOWER GOLD CLEARANCE//TOWER GOLD
CLEARANCE REQUIRED//ALL OTHERS TUNE TO 4.05 FOR EVACUATION PROCEDURES//

The message repeats. It’s a Union omninet blast, automated, with an option to input clearance.
A brief investigation of the publicly accessible broadcast hash attached to the message
indicates that the first cycle began months ago, during the peak of the battles against Beggar
One.
*

Tuning to the public broadcast, you hear the following:

ALL NONESSENTIAL PERSONNEL WILL PROCEED TO THE FOLLOWING SAFE

EVACUATION ZONES: [coordinates follow, highlighting points outside of Evergreen with ample
space for shuttles to land]. EXPECT SUPPORT ARRIVAL BEGINNING STANDARD YEAR END
5015u.

The message repeats. Tuned to the Tower Gold broadcast, you hear the following:

TOWER GOLD CLEARANCE ACCEPTED. HOLD FOR DATABRIEF: [a massive data dump
follows, updating player maps with a list of objectives, waypoints, points of interest, evacuation
routes, known-unknowns, bombardment corridors, early sat-scout reports, and more
information]

IF: UNION-FLAGGED MILFORCE: PROCEED TO NEAREST LZ AND MAKE SECURE. HOLD

FOR REINFORCEMENTS. LOG THEATER INFORMATION. LOG NHP PANOPTIC DATA.
INDICATE IF/F TRANSPONDER CODES WITH THIS MESSAGE AND WAIT FOR
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT.

IF: UNION-FLAGGED DIPLOMATIC/CIVILIAN ENTITY: STORE MOBILE COPY OF THEATER

DATA AND BURN ON-SITE HARDCOPY. PROCEED TO NEAREST LZ AND SHELTER IN
PLACE.

IF: OTHER/CLEARANCE APPROVED: [unreadable data burst follows]

98
The message repeats.

Union is aware of the situation on Hercynia; Following the events of Act II, Union Theater
Command dispatched a system-proximal patrol — the UNS Monte Grappa and UNS Piave, a
pair of low-tonnage frigates — to Hercynia. They carry a complement of about 2,000 marines
and material enough for 100 fully outfitted chassis; they’ll arrive by winter 5015u. A second,
larger force is underway, but will not arrive until winter 5017u at the earliest.

Union’s first order is to assess the situation and establish theater control.

Closing
Winter, 5014u, ends with the establishment of the first, tenuous permanent space aboveground.
Hercynians, Endeavour-Egregorians, and the people of Evergreen have joined in a necessary
alliance in order to survive the winter. Life, as they knew it, is very different now that the
Machine has gone into a kind of remission; the work left is not that of war, but of rebuilding.

5014u ends with a humble celebration marking the passing of the year in the cleared space
above Mycol Fields — a sprawling settlement most people just call Home.

99
Spring, 5015u
It was in the first warm morning, the end of winter. The swelling of the valley’s rivers, the return
of small creatures, the greening of the world.

Spring, in all its color and gentle heat. Spring, thawing the world. Spring was here — and with its
arrival the work of rebuilding redoubled.

*
Building Home
The grip of winter recedes. The passes clear. The streets of the aboveground city give way to
static rivers of mud as the belowground population emerges into the crisp spring air. The world
lightens. The survivors of the Hercynian United Cities and Evergreen have spent the winter
gathered above ground, pushed together by necessity in the land above Mycol Fields. Now, it is
springtime, heralded by the sound of saws, hammers, cheerful shouts, and the clamor of a city
growing between drifts of grey and melting snow.

In this season, your party will — out of character — define the bones of this new settlement and
the work that their characters have done to help build it. Each player may define the location of
one of the following necessary features of the new settlement — if there are more you wish to
add, feel free to place the initial constructions. At this point, these necessary features are
temporary structures built around or next to as-yet unfinished permanent buildings. Some may
be completed already, barring reinforcement to their existing structures.

● Endeavour’s hall, the administrative heart of this settlement built inside the old hive
tower17 atop Mycol Fields. Here Endeavour rests in its extended reverie, cared for by
attendants.
● The ranger barracks, armory, and motor pool. The bulk of the active-duty rangers can be
found here while deployed, ready to fight if need be. The armory is kept under guard.
The motor pool is where the rangers’ vehicles and chassis are kept, as well as
necessary materiel, parts, and supplies for repairing and maintaining those vehicles and
chassis.
● The entrance to Mycol Underground. Mycol Underground is still quite populated by the
Mycolians who live there: they produce massive amounts of edible mushrooms, cave
plants, textiles, and other products that keep Home well supplied. The entrance to Mycol
Underground is a heavily trafficked access point, and a place of frequent friction
between Mycolians, refugees from the United Cities, and refugees from Evergreen
looking to transit between Underground and Home.
● The residential districts of the city — i.e. where the most people live — and what they
look like. Are they refurbished above ground ruins, new construction, orderly rows of
tents? What are their names? Are they segregated by city, or largely integrated after the
events of the war against Beggar One?

17 You may describe what the remains of the tower looks like, so long as you establish that it is big!

100
● Important details of the nearby river that irrigates Home — are there bridges? Ferries?
Islands that separate the river into channels?
● The “center of town” and what it looks like. Is there a makeshift monument papered with
missing persons flyers? An old ruin around which people congregate for communal
meals? A crossroads where grim-faced rangers man a central checkpoint? The center of
town for Home will speak to Home’s character — make sure you plan this one with care.
● Something old — an artifact of the ancient Egregorian settlement that used to be above
Mycol Fields. Is it paved roads? A massive, cracked-but-sturdy dome? A crumbling
series of ring walls, low and moss-covered, but still visible? Old landing pads? Ancient
silos, their mouths half open, revealing deep, empty pits that once held missiles? The
ruins of a Union ship that crashed to Hercynia?
● A place to relax — are there communal meal-halls? Taverns? Is there ground staked out
for parks? Do children climb and slide down the lower flank of the old hive tower?
● Home’s first defenses — is it regular patrols of rangers? Watchtowers dotting the
settlement? Static defenses (walls, trenches) outside of the growth boundary?
● There are three mountain passes that allow entrance to Home’s valley. How close
together are they, and how developed are the passes? Do they have a year-round
ranger post? A wide, paved road? Or is it a single footpath, marked by tall, banner-
topped stakes for when the snow grows deep?
● Where does the city draw power from?

Home is not a perfect place, nor is it a city with a wholly complete infrastructure —
there are complications facing down the city’s leaders and people. The party should
define what some of those complications are. Some possible examples:

Food shortage
Inconsistent electricity
Illness
Exposure to extreme cold
Housing shortage
Flooding

It may be worth specifying some complications in order to make more precarious

Home’s situation at the outset of Act III.

101
Available Beats
Beat: A New Dawn (Spring 5015u)
Endeavour wakes up following the defeat of Beggar One. Roused from their catatonic state,
Endeavour is lucid, but needs time to recover — they have been steeped in a nostalgic loop,
caught in the terror of Hercynia’s first death, lived and re-lived until the moment they came back
to consciousness.

Endeavour speaks of solitude in the darkness. Their catatonic state was not quiet for them: they
saw Hercynia as it was and is. Endeavour watched the marshalled forces of the Bicam and the
second Machine lay siege to Bella Costa, chaperoned through the nightmare by a second,
shadowy figure.
*

“I am used to living other lives. I am not accustomed to one living my life. I was a guest in my
own coma.” Endeavour rustled their vestigial wings, their crown drawn flat against the top of
their head. Discomfort apparent across their grand figure.

“There is another like me, and they showed me nightmares across the ocean. A map of stones.
More beings like Beggar. There is death there, and it means to come once more to our shores.”
Endeavour pushed a wave of calm as it spoke, noticeable across all of your hearts. “The
Machine is not done with us. We must prepare.”

Endeavour’s awakening means a number of things. First, they are the ultimate authority of
Home — they sit at the heart of the city, at the head of the High Command, and their approval or
denial is ultimate.

The city’s Egregorian population immediately grows far more comfortable, confident, and
assured. Their center, their missing sense of community and shared-self, has returned. Non-
empath humans can even perceive the overarching Witness-sharing — it can be perceived in
quiet moments, almost like the sound of blood rushing through your head (a soft whoosh/static).

Terror is at their friend Endeavour’s side day and night for the first week of their recovery. They,
along with all other Egregorians in the city, seem healthier, more vibrant. If asked, none of them
really have an answer, but Endeavour has an idea:

*
“We were never meant to languish below our earth. Something is happening. Our mind is
growing larger.”
*
This Beat will occur regardless of player interaction.

102
Beat: Open Comms II (Spring 5015u)
The following will likely remain unknown to the players, but should be noted for your timeline. Of
course, this all may be shared if your narrative calls for it.

The queued SOS calls released once Beggar One died in the winter of 5014u were not
restricted to Union channels. Before the Union auto-embargo was able to quarantine the
broadcast, system-local SSC relays captured the outgoing transmission and send it on to
Landmark18 and Smith Shimano Corpro19.

Both companies respond with strength. Landmark, to protect its investment, and SSC to support
its own investment in Landmark’s colonial ventures. Landmark ordered a Colonial Relief Force
to route from a nearby affiliate world: this relief force, Weatherglass-Torricelli20, will arrive in full
strength by late fall 5015u. If the players are associated with Landmark or SSC, they’ll be
integrated into the mission as advisors, subordinate to the CRF’s commanding officer. If the
players are associated with Union, they’ll remain as independent advisors and experience
jurisdictional friction with the CRF’s commanding officer. If the players are independent of Union,
Landmark, and SSC, the CRF’s commanding officer will treat them as subordinates at best,
interlopers at worst.

LCRF-WT’s leader, Colonel Laramie Hault, is of rank equal to a Union Colonel. They have not
heard, read, or seen anything from Eddie Wu’s CRT beyond initial tactical assessments,
surveys, and mission reports — it’s likely that Eddie’s report has been buried somewhere in
Landmark’s archives, and the man himself similarly hidden away behind corporate firewalls.

LCRF-WT and Landmark-aligned players

The function of the players in their command structure, so long as the CRF’s commander
remains a Landmark Officer — if one of the players fits the bill and it makes sense in the
narrative for them to take over as CO, the CRF’s officer becomes an executive officer. Be
warned (or, don’t warn the player just yet, but know this): that deposed officer will be watching
closely, and if the player’s conduct goes against Landmark’s interests, the deposed officer will
likely attempt a mutiny — and win.

LCRF-WT’s immediate objectives

Recovering all Patience caskets (Evergreen, Quiet_Night). Establishing a MOB in a secure area
in order to recover physical claim over Hercynia. Transferring theater command to Landmark
until Union’s arrival. Prioritizing the best interests of the company.

18This in addition to any messages, broadcasts, etc, sent by Landmark’s Crisis Response Team during
Act II.
19 If, for whatever reason, these SOS messages are not sent, the situation on Hercynia is still known to
Landmark and SSC even if the specifics are not. The Crisis Response Team’s timeline of operations acts
as a kind of deadman’s switch: if they do not respond by a certain time, Landmark will respond with
strength.
20 Two ships, the Weatherglass and the Torricelli, give their name to the Colonial Relief Force.

103
Beat: Wild Growth I (Spring 5015u)
Beggar One has been defeated, but many of its subaltern hordes remain, wandering the fields
and wider valley outside of Evergreen in regular loops. Some of these groups appear to be
wandering in very wide loops: they’re almost walking straight. Command needs an idea of their
strength, number, and composition. Furthermore, if they are indeed Loopers and not discrete
subaltern forces led by a capable commander, Command needs units tagged in order to
develop a predicted route.

There are three marches, moving as synthetic rivers of silicon, steel, and carbon. Subalterns
walk amongst the plodding legs of industrial walkers. Hollow chassis and battle-frame subs
march in a mockery of parade, weapons humming with bleed-heat. Scattered through the press
of machine bodies are hollow chassis, tall beasts bearing old war-banners of Beggar One.

The Loopers march in parade across the raw earth, collapsing trees, buildings, surging through
creeks, and over walls — any obstacle in their way is ground beneath their feet or treads.
Stopping them head-on means building significant barriers

March Alpha is primarily composed of subalterns and industrial drones, what look to be the
collected surviving units of Beggar One’s primary force. They wind across the land from the
fields beyond Evergreen, following the valley floor on approach to Home. The whole swarm
stretches four kilometers long, and tends to keep a uniform fifty-meter front rank; there are some
vanguard subalterns — groups of three to five subalterns or lonely individual units — that
precede the larger swarm; they appear to have some kind of organization, and walk carrying tall
bannerpoles, as if guiding the rest of the swarm.

March Beta hikes across the flooded planes outside of Evergreen, sloshing through thigh-high
perennial marshes as they make their way for the mountain ranges. More so than the other two
Marches, this one seems well organized and well armed; they have what amounts to a leader —
a subaltern mounted on the back of an industrial walker, hauling the shattered casket of
Patience-Evergreen along with it.

March Delta has the highest concentration of hemorrhage chassis, though is the farthest away
from any population center. Its path will bring it to Laguna, and then — unless they stop — down
into the Lagunan Straight and beyond.

The Marches can be defeated through combat, though there are hundreds of thousands of
individual units. Non-narrative tactical combat is best reserved for groups of significant enemies
seeded throughout the swarm: hemorrhage chassis, hollow chassis, and particularly hardened
swarms of subalterns.

In investigating the Marches, the players find that they’re leaderless, but broadcasting; similarly,
they have an orbit — slight that it may be — which indicates a center point, some focal object
around which they march21.

21This, it would appear later, is a bit of a red herring: the Marches are not orbiting an object center to
them. It is an artifact of their pathing, nothing more.

104
After they encounter, track, and plot out the second massive swarm, they’ll notice that the
second swarm’s orbit intersects with the first, though given early predictive models the swarms
themselves are not likely to meet along their paths. The third swarm, it can be assumed, will
overlay as well, triangulating a center point where all three center circles intersect.

Closing
The last of the snow melts, leaving only the white-capped mountains. The passes cleared
months ago, and the days are beginning to grow long. The bright blankets of wildflowers and
gentle blooms give way to the high grasses of late spring. The trees have come back. Hunters
return from the woods, their carts heavy with game.

The air grows humid. The whirring buzz of annual insect broods fills the day. To cheers and
warm welcome, the first refugee caravans arrive in town, safe after weathering a winter trapped
on the other side of the mountains.

Summer is here, you’re sure of it.

105
Summer, 5015u
Whole broods of Summer’s Herald cry out in rising and falling chorus, the keening buzz an ever-
present sound during Hercynia’s thick, muggy summers. Listen to them sing, and find shelter
when they stop: that means the rains are coming.

The players (unless they chose not to be, or have been cast out) are active participants in the
community. As spring’s thaw cracked winter’s grip, the high season of summer brings Hercynia
once more into bloom. The foundation of the city — and the relationships you’ve established in
the early days — are ready to be built upon. Now is a very good time for major downtime
actions.

Building
You spent the majority of the winter and spring working on the surveying, design, construction,
or maintenance of the new hive tower, the city that must be built in and around it, or some other
feature (or suite of features) of Home.

Choose a project, and describe what you did to help it get underway. Maybe you organized
crews to clear brush and lay down packed dirt and gravel roads; or maybe you used your
chassis in the construction of new buildings and reinforcement of the old; or maybe you worked
to build out the city’s infrastructure, digging drainage ditches or running wire. Either way, know
this: if there comes a time in the future that your knowledge, experience, contacts, or access
might be necessary, you’ll be able to rely on someone you worked with (or for!) for a favor.

If the project was a success, the community has a good view of you — unless something else
has caused your reputation to sour — and you likely have many former colleagues scattered
across the city. You can proudly claim some credit for the completion of the project you helped.

Exploring
With winter behind you and the thaw of spring a welcome sight, you spent your time exploring
in, around, under, or outside of the bounds of Home. Did you lead a team, or strike out on your
own? Do you return towards the end of summer 5015u, or the beginning? Have you kept
detailed, hardcopy (or digital) notes of everything you have seen, surveyed, and scouted, or
have you kept it all in your head?

Choose a location, or define your own (subject to GM approval): Mycol Underground, Home -
City Center, Home - Districts, Home’s Valley, Evergreen, Ruins of the Hive Cities, Specific
Wilderness on the United Cities’ Continent. You have a general knowledge of the landscape,
plus a detailed knowledge of your chosen area. You may call upon this knowledge when you
want, and as a kind of “flashback” in a high-pressure situation.

106
In addition, describe a safe place (or series of safe places) where you and a small group of
people (dismounted, trying to remain unseen or hidden) could make a secure camp in the
specific area you chose. This can also be done as a flashback.

Defending
Shore up the hive tower’s defenses, track and hunt down wandering subaltern swarms, fight off
probing attacks from Patience’s subalterns. Maybe it wasn’t a peaceful period for you — or
maybe, set against the terror of Beggar One’s attacks, any fights you encountered were
insignificant compared to what you once knew.

You may name a new NPC or an existing, non-command NPC. You have a friendly camaraderie
with them now (or a deeper relationship, if you’d like) and can call on them for favors,
companionship, help, as a character witness, access, or just to have a good time. They can do
the same to you.

Complications: Constant Battle Posture

Constant battle posture is not healthy for a person, no matter how hard they appear.
Choose one of the following, to be applied to your character in Spring 5016u:
● Reduce your maximum pilot HP by 1 until you have an extended downtime
period (GM’s discretion).
● You gain a Burden, Fatigued, which means that until your next downtime
period, you cannot go first in the initiative order.
● You or your GM develop a consequence for sustained stress you both feel is
appropriate.

You may name a unit of Rangers that you fought with, detailing them as you wish. It’s an infantry
unit — you were their chassis — numbering around 20 rangers. You may, as a flashback, aside,
or out of character action in the present day (anything taking place in spring 5016u+), place
them in a critical location or point in time after summer 5015u — GM’s discretion, as always.
They’ll be better equipped to handle whatever situation they’re placed in, but they’ll also suffer
any negative consequences instead of the NPC that should have been there.

Training
You put your knowledge and veterancy to civic good, helping to train new Home Ranger recruits
in basic tactics, skills, and proficiencies.

You’d most likely use martial or tactical trigger keywords to act in this staff role, though
ultimately the best-fit skill is up to the GM to decide.

● On a 1:
○ You make no progress with these yokels. You walk away in frustration, and some
of the new recruits quit as well, discouraged. Terror, Ilyr, Mirth, and Dthall might
have a lower opinion of you as a result of this sloppy attempt at leadership.

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 ● On the roll of a 9 or lower, pick one:
■ Your training is well-received but… isn’t great. Some recruits might be better
shots now, but their officers are less inclined to trust your command. Rumors of
your clumsy attempt spread through the Home Rangers, and in the field they’ll
not be inclined to obey your orders.

■ You were able to locate and secure a steady supply of standardized parts: a
low-priority fabrication order in a milspec printer, or a steady — if meagre —
supply of a bespoke item. However, even pulling that few strings didn’t come for
free.

● You owe your supplier a real one now. Name them, and know the GM will
have them call to collect when they need a favor from you.

■ You lent some NHP downtime processing power to puzzle out a particularly
taxing strategy sim, bringing cascade threshold far too close. You have access
to all of the insight gathered because of the exercise, but you’ll either have to
put your NHP in a dormant state or cycle them, just to be safe.

● Note, if you choose to risk it and not cycle them, though any tech action
you perform while in combat has a % chance to force your chassis into
shutdown, beginning at 10% and increasing by ten with each attempted
tech action. This goes away if your mech shuts down.

● On a result of a 10-15, choose one:

■ You impress Terror, and they loop you in to their planning sessions (and
“planning sessions” at the officer’s mess). Your consultation will wind up saving
lives: if a Minor attack would result in the death of an NPC known to your
character, that character is instead only wounded and extracted safely.

■ Your help training the militia pays off. While no combat is without blood, the
efforts you went through with the units you were given to train has saved some
lives: If a Minor attack would result in a you or an NPC being wounded and
temporarily taken out of commission, instead you or that NPC only suffer a
minor injury, nothing dramatic.

● On a result of a 16+

■ Your expertise shines through, and you accomplish the task at hand with stellar
results. In addition, the next narrative combat, attack, or hostile action that
involves the unit(s) you worked with or area you fortified won’t be as costly for
your side: the precise result is up to the GM.

Settling In
Maybe this time was a time for peace — Hercynia is a world aching for peace, after all. What did
you make in the time between terrors? A family? A trade? A simpler life somewhere? Maybe you
developed a new skill, or perfected a new hobby. Did you put away your weapons and enjoy the
healing world? Or did you escape to the deeper woods and make a solitary life for yourself?

This is a relatively free-form option, one that you could — if your GM allows — choose
alongside other options as, indeed, life involves a fair amount of settling in, regardless of what
you’re doing in your day to day.

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Choose something that your character has spent the better part of 5015u doing (not
represented by the options above). You make one or more friends in that field, they can be new
NPCs or existing ones that make sense in context. You deepen your presence in a district of the
city, and have deeper knowledge of it — at the same time, you’re more easily recognized in that
area of the city. If you’ve opened a business of some kind, you have a product (or group of
products) that you’re known for, a little bit of an income, and a knowledge of your sources and
suppliers. You may have a property in the city as well.

The limits of “Settling In” are really up to you and your GM.

Available Beats
Beat: A Long Patrol I (Summer 5015u)
In the course of establishing a permanent above ground settlement, the city’s engineering corps
establish basic radio and light communications, allowing for safer ranging abroad.

Ever since the Hercynians received the first distress call from Bella Costa — and bolstered by
Endeavour’s revelations following their resuscitation — Mirth and Dthall have been eager to
mount an expedition to Laguna, an important trade port abandoned decades prior when the
Machine first appeared on the continent.

With increased radio and tightbeam coverage, Mirth volunteers their rangers to venture to
Laguna — if there are any survivors from Bella Costa, they would likely have made for the port.
In any case, refreshing the map couldn’t hurt, and Laguna is likely rich with salvage.

They plan to mount an expedition of rangers, Humans and New Doctrine Egregorians, and a
complement of chassis supported by a convoy of logistics trucks — 6x6 cargo trucks laden with
ammunition and supplies. The march there will follow the old high road and check in on the
long-isolated waystations that once dotted the thousand kilometer trek.

There is little trouble in outfitting the expedition: it has the blessing of Terror and Commander
Ilyr. The difficulty comes in balancing out how many Rangers and chassis the players feel Mirth
should bring with them.

At present, Home’s complement of rangers should be a mere 2 to 3% of its population.

Assuming its population is in the low millions, this should translate to a battle-ready fighting
force numbering in the tens of thousands; Home’s military command (at present) desires that
the majority of those rangers remain garrisoned in and around Home on account of the
approaching March Alpha; Mirth and Dthall’s expedition can take at maximum a thousand
rangers.

As GM, know that Home will come under attack while the expedition is away. The best bet the
players have to ensure Home survives largely unscathed is to be there to defend it. If they’re not
there, then any training and shoring up of defenses they’ve done during the previous seasons
will go a long way to improving Home’s chances.

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The ranger force departs towards the end of summer 5015u, crossing the passes before the
winter closes them down; as they’re heading to the coast, winter will not threaten their lives, just
slow their progress.

Closing
Summer ends as the days begin to grow long.

Mirth, Dthall, and their rangers leave for Laguna, sent off with a march through the city center.

110
Fall, 5015u
A crisp, bright fall. Home has been built out to a safe and stable community and is growing.
Terror and Commander Iker adopt leadership roles, uniting the rangers and the militia as a
single force, simply called rangers now. Mirth is given a command position, as is Dthall Ordo.

The Landmark relief force arrives.

Available Beats
Wild Growth II (Fall 5015u)
The Landmark force Weatherglass-Torricelli arrives in system, announcing themselves by a
flight of shuttles streaking low over Home. Local radio and omninet channels are overwhelmed
with an automated handshake, declaring LCRF-WT’s jurisdiction over the world and announcing
their intent to land. All Landmark colonists and personnel are ordered to report to LCRF-WT’s
commanding officer/staff once the green zone is established: LCRF-WT settles down upriver
from Home, their shuttles ferrying a steady stream of soldiers, prefab buildings, and supplies
down from their orbiting carriers.
*
The mottled, sky-blue bellies of the shuttles overhead confirm what the preview transponders
already told you: Landmark is here.

A delta of three Landmark dropships streak across the sky, their engines firing in a descent
pattern as they clear the low cloud ceiling. On your HUD, crisp wireframes highlight the outlines
of more plunging into the atmosphere, firing anti-missile flares as they break for dispersal points.

Trajectory has them heading towards Home; your hails go unanswered.

Endeavour allows Landmark to land and dig in under advisement from their commanders —
Home’s rangers outnumber the Landmark forces, but there’s no reason this needs to break
down to a shootout when diplomacy is still available. Landmark’s green zone is built up over the
course of a week, a tense process of clear-cutting, fencing, and digging in as rangers and
Landmark officers watch each other across a space of a hundred meters of no-man’s land.

*
Landmark’s green zone is an orderly prefab compound of rigid, climate-controlled tents, gabion
walls filled with packed mud and straw, layered fencing and triple concertina, and squat, flash-
print hardwall structures. Grey-green uniformed Landmark security officers have already made
this place home — they sit in groups at native-wood tables, cleaning their rifles, hand-loading
magazines, playing cards for cigarettes. Some dig trenches alongside half-size chassis, or tend
to combat subalterns. A few ranking officers walk with shimmering projections — Patience, you

111
recognize the familiar face atop the uniformed body — followed by humming projectors, casting
AR field images of the more permanent base to come.

The security officers regard you as you pass, sizing you up. They’re a tough looking crew, skin
pallid from transit D-loss, some sporting the beginnings of down-well beards, most clean-cut.
Their gear was standardized, with some variation allowed. These aren’t mercenaries, you
realize — they’re professionals, here not for the money but for the cause.

Our Worlds, One Sky — Landmark’s motto. There may not be many true believers, but there
sure are a helluva lot of them here.

A Landmark officer in field fatigues approaches you, accompanied by a Patience projection and
a pair of armed guards.

“Afternoon,” the officer greets you, arms crossed behind their back. “I’m Colonel Hault.
Welcome to Camp Showstopper.”

Despite appearances in the field, communication between Landmark and Home’s leaders is
ongoing and professional — not congenial, but at the top level there’s little chance of hostility.
Colonel Hault has an open invitation to meet with Commanders Illyn and Terror, and likewise the
Commanders.

Landmark’s priorities run parallel-ish to Home’s: while Home doesn’t particularly care about
Evergreen or Patience, they do care about stopping the incoming March and countering the
Bicam’s invasion — Landmark intends to operate as an independent force, offering to
compensate Home and their rangers if they fight alongside them.

Camp Showstopper - Access

Camp Showstopper is open to the players with restrictions commensurate with their
clearance level. If they are with Landmark, once they pass inspection they’ll have,
essentially, free range of the place. This freedom of movement doesn’t come without
a cost, however — they’ll be integrated into Landmark’s command structure and
subject to Colonel Hault’s authority.

If the players are not affiliated with Landmark, they’ll have limited access to the
camp. If they’re Union agents, soldiers, or affiliated in an official capacity, they’ll be
granted more access than unaffiliated parties.

Meanwhile, the three marches continue across the continent.

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March Alpha winds towards the base of the mountains just outside of Home’s valley. They will
arrive by winter 5015u.

March Beta slogs north through the flooded land outside of Evergreen, turning east towards the
coast. The Landmark relief force will ride out to mount an attack on the march, seeking to
eliminate it and take back the Patience-Evergreen casket it carries.

The humid summer air whips through the shuttle’s open doors, a thrumming, solid thing
pushing you back into the shuttle’s dim belly. The shuttle cants a few degrees as its pilot banks
into a turn, and the world a few hundred meters below is picked out in green and gold. The
morning sunlight shines off the mirror surface of flooded fields as scattered patches of mist
drifts through the tall grasses.

The march isn’t hard to spot. An orderly, winding column twenty — no, thirty — meters across,
its head and tail lost in the mist. Subalterns in rags, most armed. Seeded throughout are the
heavier bulks of agricultural and transport drones, with yet more subalterns — these in armor
and finer clothing — perched on their dorsal planes. Somewhere at their head is their leader,
and with it, Evergreen’s Patience casket. Your objective.

A Landmark shuttle, N-203a on its tail, streaks below your little window into the world trailing
threads of condensation. Its door gunner hangs half out of the shuttle’s bay, straining against
their harness to peer down at the masses below.

“Hold your fire,” the Landmark commander says across the company allcomm. “Save your
rounds for what we need to kill.”

Your shuttle levels out, and you can see the full delta of the Landmark force across the sky. A
chevron of dropships, so small against the endless river below.

Landmark has one objective with this march: locate the Patience casket and retrieve it. The
casket is guarded by an “honor guard” of hollow chassis, armed subalterns, and some heavy
industry drones. This is likely a stand-up fight — a difficult one, but nothing terribly esoteric —
threatened by an encroaching tide of subalterns.

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A Long Patrol II (Fall 5015u)

The high canopy of the forest does little to block the buzzing heat. Light dapples through the
treetops, and the ground steams with stinking, rotting leaves. The ground is slick underfoot, and
progress is slow.

Even as Hercynia slides back into winter, summer’s death is long.

Human and Egregorian Rangers march along the old high road, booted feet slipping on the old
stones. Their packs bounce on their backs, the light jingling of mess kits and grenades drowned
out by the constant call of bugs, the low rumble of the magazine trucks, your chassis.

In the mountains, you wished for the forests. In the forests, now you wish for the coast — even
if it means combat, at least there will be a cool breeze.

A pair of Egregorian scouts come running down the road, low, to the lead truck at the head of
the column where Mirth is mounted. The rangers halt without a command, sliding off the road
to ready positions.

“Movement, two kilometers up ahead,” Dthall whispers across the command allcomm. “Human
and Egregorian, unknown uniforms, unknown markings. Armed.”

“Hostile?” A squad leader asks.

“Hang on — presumed hostile, yes. Uncap lances, free safety — button up, rangers, and my
people: cover your crowns, do not Witness until I command.”

Mirth’s order chills the late summer heat. Quietly, the column resumes progress, squads
breaking off into the deeper woods to spread the line.

Ahead: war.

Progress along the high road has been slow. The woods themselves seem eager to block your
progress: tumbled old-growth trees lay thick across the shattered asphalt road, each one
needing to be cut or dragged away to clear a path for the logistics trucks at the rear of the
ranger column. Where there is no road, summer rains have turned the path into algae-green
marshland, or sucking mud.

Summer’s long days have begun to grow cold. Fall is upon you.

A number of small towns, camps, and ruins dot the high road to Laguna. None seem to have
been occupied in a long while. You’ve found evidence of old life: discarded containers, rotted

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clothing, spent shells. At one encampment you came across the abandoned carcass of an old
Union wheeled APC, its rear door thrown open and rusted on its hinges, belly packed full of
downy leaves and sticks — home now to some forest creature.

Mirth and Dthall are working of a digitized version of an old, hand-drawn map. None of the small
settlements, camps, and small towns you’ve come across were marked on this map; so far, only
two of the larger settlements you’ve crossed have appeared on the map, with a third still ahead
of you; the first town you encountered was gone, presumably burnt to cinders at some point.
The second was largely desolate, only a few thin buildings standing, the rest overgrown by the
encroaching forest.

Though these towns have been abandoned for a very long time, there is evidence of recent
encampment: days-old cinders from camp fires, flattened grasses, some packaging trash.
Someone has been through here within the week.

Mirth and Dthall inform the players that the machine’s forces first arrived22 on the continent
about sixty years ago, ten or so years prior to Evergreen’s establishment. These towns are likely
from well before that time, somewhere in the lost centuries between the end of the Crisis and
the first attack by the Machine.

The Machine emerged at Laguna, your destination, about 50 kilometers down the high road
from your current location. It took Laguna by surprise, overwhelming the city’s modest defenses
and advancing deep into the interior; the Hercynian United Cities attempted to stymie the
incursion, and failed. The towns, camps, settlements, and bivouacs were the sites of momentary
ground-holding battles, where doomed rangers would hold against the advancing machine to
buy the retreating civilians more time.

There was no time to bury the dead; there are no grave markers. The only monuments to the
battles fought are the wrecked vehicles, fallen trees, and rusted metal remains.

“Terror told me of it once,” Dthall said. She spoke while cleaning her rifle, the small parts spread
out neatly on a clean rag. “Witnessed it to me. The thing that sticks in my head is the smell —
rotting fish. Seaweed. That… sour smell of old synthflesh. That was what hit Laguna, a wave of
rotting subalts.”

Mirth lumbered out from the darkness, having finished attending to their Egregorian rangers.
Their crown was high — you could feel the Witness in your jaw, a sparking twitch of nerves that
didn’t quite hurt, but wasn’t comfortable.

There was a coherence in the dissonance. An image barely held in your mind, a memory of a
dream from days ago: an ache through your shoulder from firing your rifle, an ache through your
lungs and legs from running, a ringing in your ears that won’t stop. The wailing sirens, and the

22Refer to Factions and Locations for more information on the first Machine incursion, the loss of
Laguna, and other history to share with the players.

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flames reaching higher higher higher — the ships dragged under — the sea itself boiling as they
stagger out, then run, run faster than you — and the falling rain, pattering on your helm and the
trees above, and the lights in the darkness — a screaming column of civilians fleeing as you
fired over their heads at the machine that ground the slowest or most burdened — the howling.

You — now — shake your head, blinking back tears from the other’s fear and desperation and
pain.

“Mirth, less present,” Dthall said, placing a hand on Mirth’s shoulder. “It’s a lot.”

Mirth lowered their crown. The hot stink of a dying city disappeared. The encroaching beasts
slipped away. “Apologies,” Mirth said. “You think you are ready and you are not. I was tempering
the younger rangers, who feel the same eagerness.”

“Don’t break their spirit yet, we need them ready to fight soon.”

Mirth chuffed, agreeing.

The rest of the night was quiet. Your dreams were terrible, and you woke before dawn. It was a
cool dawn, crisp. Closer to the sea than the interior now. Rangers lay in small groups, bunked
on cots under drapes of bug netting, their rifles and lances tucked next to them.

The end of today would bring you nearly to the coast, where Laguna and all its ghosts lie in wait.
But first, Town 03.

A mix of cement and metal roadblocks, long overgrown by vines, creeping ferns, and moss, litter
the road, making progress by vehicle all but impossible without significant work. Rusted vehicles
jammed bumper to bumper clog the roadway before them, heavy with long-dead subalterns.
Beyond, you can pick out the progress of the road by the clearing in the old growth.

The sun rises down the road. It is quiet, cool, and pretty — wildflowers bloom, gifts of the burn
that spread through here a half-century ago.

Mirth and Dthall have ordered a squad of rangers to remain behind and help guard the trucks as
a small complement of engineers work with their chassis to clear the road. The bulk of the
rangers will advance the ten kilometers or so down the road to Town 03.

The forests grow thin before the waystation town, which occupies the summit of a low mound in
the wide stretch of plains outside of Laguna. An hour’s observation will reveal that Town 03 is
presently occupied by a force of Bicameral scouts, who have converted it to a forward redoubt
for the invading army.

New construction — wooden towers, sandbag walls, gun pits, trenches, and wire — evidence
the occupation; old wreckage in the fields mark the old retreat (and provide some cover through

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the tall, bare grass): a pair of rusted, listing Union tanks covered in lichen and small wildflowers,
the carcass of an old Genghis Mk I, its cockpit cracked open, its reactor core missing.

Scouting the town will reveal that the small garrison there has installed a buried hardline back to
Laguna, following the road for the 30 or so kilometers between them. Regular runners between
the two towns indicate further coordination and supply, as convoys of trucks bring tarp-covered
weapons and ammunition to harden the town.

There are four fresh pillboxes controlling the approach to the town, two on each side of the old
cobblestone road. Around a hundred and sixty Bicam troops, mostly from Bem Honore, are
garrisoned in the town; a small complement of Solitude Egregorians are with them. The town is
sighted by the naval guns of the Bicam’s ships in the Lagunan straight, and the company
commander in the town has the capability to call down fire support with a delay.

An outright attack on this town will warn the larger force at Laguna, likely making any attack on
Laguna more difficult for the players. The safest bet for the players’ party is likely to attempt to
sneak around the town, or to sever the town’s communications and then attack — though
failure to remain hidden during this clandestine attempt would, likewise, alert the larger force at
Laguna.

The Battle of Town 03

If the players decide to engage the Bicam forces garrisoned in Town 03, it might be a good idea
to introduce them to the Battle mechanic and the Battle Tracker. This would be a Standard
Battle as described in the section on Major Attacks and Battles in the GM Tools chapter of this
book.

A Standard Battle features one positive Pivotal Moment and one negative Pivotal Moment.
We’ve included a couple examples in this section, though don’t feel obliged to use them;
instead, think of these examples as just that — examples, yours to use if you want, or as
inspiration for your own particularized Moments.

Death In The Fields (Narrative)

If the Battle Track crosses -3, your players encounter the first negative Pivotal Moment. The
Bicameral force has seeded anti-infantry mines across the fields, roads, and approaches
towards Town 03. Your side just encountered them.

The first blast releases a pressure wave that rocks your chassis. A gout of mud and fire erases
a pair of rangers. In the moments after, two more explosions shake apart the quiet advance.
Landmines.

Sirens and warning cries echo up from Town 03, the gunfire just after. The mined field slows
your retreat, and as the rangers struggle to either find cover or fall back, the cold grip of fear
twists your gut: your attack might fail.

Hollow Hope (Direct Combat)

If the Battle Track crosses -3, your players encounter the first negative Pivotal Moment. The
Bicameral force garrisoned in Town 3 is supported by a section of hollow chassis. They move

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out of the town to engage, prompting a normal combat. If the players are forced to withdraw, the
battle is lost. If they are victorious, move the Battle Track to 0.

Escalation (Battle Track Modification)

If the Battle Track crosses -3, your players encounter the first negative Pivotal Moment. Drone
coverage of the battle shows reinforcements approaching from Laguna. The battle is going to
escalate. Raise the victory condition on the Battle Track by d6, reduce the defeat track by half of
the number rolled, minimum of 1.

Boxcracker (Narrative)
If the Battle Track crosses +3, your players encounter the first positive Pivotal Moment. Mirth’s
rangers manage to destroy the pillboxes covering the approach to Town 03. With that threat
removed, the approach across open fields is much easier.

“Backblast! Backblast!”

The flat thump of the recoilless rifle is followed seconds later by the banshee scream of the
rocket, a white streak across the field towards the chattering emplacement. The impact prompts
cheers.

“Clean hit, the gun’s down!”

Your optics confirm the callout. Time to move. Smoke grenades arc overhead, chromatic
explosions puffing gouts of glittering blue, red, yellow, white, green, and black smoke. You
charge into the shimmering field, rangers in tow, the gates to Town 03 blown open.

Keyholder (Direct Combat)

If the Battle Track crosses +3, your players encounter the first positive Pivotal Moment. You’ve
successfully breached the town’s first defensive line, and have pushed into the old ruins, where
you encounter a leader enemy attempting to flee. Engage them and secure your victory;
otherwise, the enemy drives you back, and you must reduce the Battle Track to 0.

Friendlies Above! (Battle Track Modification)

If the Battle Track crosses +3, your players encounter the first positive Pivotal Moment. Mirth’s
voice and Witness inform you, gently, that friendly fire support is inbound on your position, and
that you should take cover. The fire support is accurate, and as the dust clears, you see that it
just might have won you the battle. Increase the defeat track by d6 points, and lower the victory
track by half that number, minimum of 1.

Any captured Bicam troops at this town are generally knowledgeable about the rough objectives
of their campaign, but ignorant of the specifics. All they know is that this invasion force
represents the largest effort by the two cities in their history. Most of these vanguard soldiers are
veterans of the early days of this second incursion and hail from St. Tellus: they’ve fought
through Bella Costa, crossed the straight, and marched out to here. This is likely their first
exposure to any United Cities’ force. Though mechanized chassis have featured in their culture,
and they likely field anti-armor weapons capable of dealing significant damage to chassis, this is
certainly their first exposure to being on the receiving end of hostile mechs.

The small group of Egregorians inside Town 03 are Solitude Egregorians. Solitude Egregorians
are marked differently than Endeavour Egregorians, though they are of similar build and stature.

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They are armed and armored for battle: their chitin has been encouraged to grow thick over
vulnerable spots, and their crowns are protected by bony ridges. They carry scaled-up versions
of the rifles that the Bicam troops wield, and are painted with — among many other markings —
recognizable human ranks and unit symbols.

Assuming the players take Town 03 — and aren’t otherwise able to stop the Bicam forces at
Laguna from being warned of their attack/presence — they shouldn’t stay for long: naval
bombardment begins as the last Bicam troops fall (or flee) and continues for an hour, walking
ranks of shells up and down the road bordering the town, and hammering the town itself.

After it stops, or after the rangers flee to safety, all is quiet. A mounted Bicam counterattack will
arrive the next morning, with troops carried in via APC and on the backs of larger drone-morph
Egregorians bred for hauling — clues at deeper integration and different relationships among
the Bicameral humans and egregorians.

It would appear that, while the garrison at Town 03 may have been caught by surprise, the
larger force (presumably) at Laguna was expecting to encounter hostile forces — they’re aware
of the United Cities, and plan to encounter them in the field.

Closing
This beat should close with the player’s omnihooks (or radios, if the do not have any
omnihooks) squawking:

TOWER GOLD, TOWER GOLD, THIS IS UNION COMMANDER DYATLOV OF THE

UNS MONTE GRAPPA. SEND “CONFIRM” AND MARK YOUR COORDINATES —
PATROL UTC-CL-05 IS IN-SYSTEM AND READY TO ASSIST.

Union is in-system. If you need them to be, they can assist immediately in laying down (mostly)
accurate cover fire, blanketing the advancing Bicam force with anti-ground orbital fire — this
volume of fire is the limit of any carpet/massive-area bombing that Commander Dyatlov is willing
to order at this time.

For the moment, Town 03 has been held. Union informs the players that they cannot land in the
players’ area, as the opposing force (Bicam) has thick anti-air/low-orbit coverage — the patrol’s
ships are currently painted with multiple targeting lasers, and optics show dozens of missile
batteries of various size and kill-zones. They’ll set down near Home, and send reinforcements in
via the cleared high road.

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 On Clearing A Path:

It’s quite possible that your players will want to try to clear a path for Union’s
reinforcements by destroying some of the local anti-air/anti-orbital missile batteries.
It is the intent of this module that the Bicam’s theater coverage of Laguna, the
Lagunan straight, and their own continent be total — however, to avoid railroading,
we encourage you to indulge your players. To that end, use the following prompt:

Union’s orbital surveillance reveals a series of mobile batteries in Laguna, a mix of

old Crisis-era Union missiles and newer, Hercynian-made copies. The old Union
models are centuries out of date, but simple and reliable, and the new ones
represent an unknown threat. Until Commander Dyatlov can get their specs, they
won’t order their pilots into the covered theater.

To open up this coast, you’ll need to find a way to disable and or destroy the
launchers in and around Laguna.

Success in this mission can be accomplished through sabotage, direct combat, or —

though difficult to the point of likely impossible — negotiations.

Meanwhile
March Alpha floods the mountain passes at Home. If Home’s defenses are not sturdy enough,
the March could break through and begin to threaten Home’s valley. Resolving the
engagements leading up to Wild Growth III, if no player characters are present in or around
Home, could be completed in cut-away action, via narrative resolution, or some combination of
the two.

March Beta continues through the fields of Evergreen, pursued by mounted Landmark troops.
Like the action around March Alpha, this can be handled via cut-away, off-screen mechanics, or
simply narrative resolution. If there are no players present, feel free to adapt this narrative
thread however you wish: you may complicate things for the players by having Landmark’s
attack fail, for example, or by having their commanding officer be killed, trigger some
catastrophic reactor failure in the March, etc.

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Winter, 5015u
It is a mild winter. The fruits of efforts made in summer pay off now, and point towards what
comes next.

Towards the end of the Winter, the Union relief force arrives in-system.

The Long Patrol reaches the first waystation town along the high road.

Available Beats
Wild Growth III (Winter 5015u)

March Alpha, unless the players find a successful method of diverting or destroying it, is nearly
upon Home. This one is likely the priority to address. If Home’s defenses are shored up, they’ll
stand a chance — but it’ll be a desperate fight.

From your vista at the pass, where the mountains met in a narrow saddle, you could see the
whole of the valley east of Home. The blasted crater in the mountain wall opposite, a massif
missing from the ridgeline like a tooth punched from a jaw. The burn fields spreading like a stain
where the forests around Evergreen once stood, and the few standing trunks of trees burnt to
cinder pillars.

Evergreen itself lay in a jumbled mess of ferrocrete, prefab, and steel. Half of the city was
flooded by the snowmelt-swollen river, the other half green with unrestrained growth. Through
optics, you could see nothing moving. The bodies that remained stripped to little more than rags
and hardened kit.

No, there was movement. One subaltern, crawling with one arm, the rest of it broken and
useless. Tenacity of the machine. You adjust your sights, tracking to forecast its movement.

The March — one of three known — stretched from just outside of Evergreen nearly to the base
of the road leading up to this very pass. Thirty kilometers of lurching machine packed shoulder
to shoulder, broken only by the lumbering bulk of industrial drones and hollow chassis. Some
flew makeshift flags of all colors stabbed into the tip of metal spears, others carried odd-pattern
coherent projectors, their heatsinks shimmering with a glow you could see through the dust of
their progress.

“Can we stop them?” A ranger at your side, staring through their own optics. “I don’t think we
have enough bullets to stop them.”

“If we don’t stop them,” you say, lowering your optics. “We all die.”

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 *

Alpha follows a rough path marching as a column towards the major pass leading down into
Home. The road up to the crossing is relatively safe: a switchback road that municipal officials
have spent the spring and summer widening, reinforcing, and paving. A strong enough force of
rangers with multiple fallback points along the switchbacks should be able to hold the road,
unless Alpha has some tricks up their sleeve23 .

Defeating March Alpha will likely be the outcome of previous planning and a positive Battle 24
outcome. This should be a large battle, with victory secured at a +11 Battle Track.

Landmark’s forces, unless there has been some successful diplomatic assurances, will likely
remain in Camp Showstopper: after engaging and defeating the leader of March Delta, they’ve
been busy re-tooling their shuttles for vacuum, building an accurate survey of Hercynia, and
preparing to depart.

If the situation gets desperate, Landmark’s forces will defend Camp Showstopper from anyone
who attempts to get in. They’ll load their shuttles and depart if all seems lost, beating a hasty,
incomplete retreat.

The Battle of Home’s Pass

March Alpha winds up the mountains towards the alpine gate of Home’s Pass, where the United
City’s rangers are dug in and waiting for them. This will be a battle of attrition, its outcome
deciding the fate of Home.

The good defensive position of the United Cities’ rangers means the Battle Track begins at +1
— better defensive preparation in prior Beats can increase this advantageous start.

Total Defeat for this battle is -14. Total Victory is +14. There are Pivotal Moments at +/-3 and
+/-7.

Lumbering Terror (Direct Combat)

When the Battle begins, or the Battle Track crosses +3 OR -3, the players have reached the first
Pivotal Moment.

Behind the scattered vanguard of the March, the head of the beast presents itself: a large
contingent of industrial deforestation drones. These machines are big (at minimum Size 3, at
maximum Size 5) and capable of wanton destruction even at their low technology level. They
are dirty machines, belching clouds of radioactive smoke as they lead the march, their massive
ground-chewing belt saws grinding away at any feature that crosses their path.

The sound of the machines is the sound of Pandemonium: the metallic, constant tumbling of

23This is, of course, entirely up to you — these marches aren’t made up only of mindless loopers. There
may be some groups of subalterns and hollow chassis in there with a spark of O/K or B1 left over. They’ll
run flanking attacks, hang back and engage the players at range, and so on.
24 See the GM Tools section in this book for more.

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blade-teeth the size of your chassis, cracking the earth to throw wide the passes for the rest of
the March to follow.

The earth-eaters tower over the land, their broad treads flattening the churned ground behind
them. They are mountains on their own, tiered with platforms and railings upon which their long-
dead pilots and crew once walked. They bristle with cannons and interdictors, defenses installed
by ancient engineers who knew these machines would only inspire hate and fear. Armor,
massive slabs of steel, skirt the earth-eaters.

How do you fight a mountain? Time to find out.

This Pivotal Moment triggers normal combat. If the players defeat the enemy before they can
reach the players deployment zone, then they players may reset the Battle Track to 0, or
advance it d6 towards victory. If one or more of the enemy units reach the players’ deployment
zone, then the GM may reset the Battle Track to 0, or advance it d6 towards defeat. This Pivotal
Moment can trigger additional Pivotal Moments.

Skyshock (Direct Combat)

When the Battle begins, or the Battle Track crosses +3 OR -3, the players have reached the first
Pivotal Moment.

Above the clouds, dark, silent shapes circle Hercynia, blended wing aircraft with terrible death in
their bellies. These are the few remaining Kilauea, nuclear powered bombers left behind by
Union after the Crisis. They were likely launched or compelled into their current paths by
Overland/Kingwatcher at some point during its cascade, their long-dead crews still strapped into
their flight seats. Now, they fly in support of Beggar One’s retreating armies, looping long and
slow on great circle paths around Hercynia. They can provide fire support in the form of directed
bombardment, a stochastic threat (they are powered by nuclear reactors, and one could crash
land near Home) or present a more existential threat: at least one of them carries a rack of
“precision” thermonuclear bombs. Defeating this bomber wing might be as simple as targeting
them with missiles, or flying up to engage them at close range.

On radar, death was a bright green smudge. Could be one, could be a flight of three in close
proximity, hard to tell with all the interference the March was throwing towards your systems.
Out into the cool grey morning, then, your breath fogging, your goggles fogging, your optics
fogging. Who decided to fight at the pass and not under it?

On your cue, the rippling report of drones fired into the morning sky. A coffee to pass the ten
minutes of climbing — no kill-tone from the drones means nothing shot them down — and then
you had vision above the clouds. Vision of death that turned your blood to ice.

The march could be seen in all clarity of course, but that was a beast you could handle. Death
was not a million marching subalterns. Death was one single unit, an elegant, blended wing with
a matte black belly and mottled white back. The edge-on silhouette, your HUD informed you, of
a Kilauea. Planet Killers. Questions, of course, but only one that mattered: how much time did
you have until it reached Home?

This Pivotal Moment triggers normal combat. If the players defeat the enemy before they can
reach the players deployment zone, then they players may reset the Battle Track to 0, or
advance it d6 towards victory. If one or more of the enemy units reach the players’ deployment
zone, then the GM may reset the Battle Track to 0, or advance it d6 towards defeat. This Pivotal
Moment can trigger additional Pivotal Moments.

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The Center Cannot Hold (Narrative)
If the Battle Track reaches -3, the players cross the first negative Pivotal Moment: the March
overwhelms their initial lines of defense at the pass. As waves of subalterns fall upon the
soldiers there, the players retreat to the second line of defense along with the surviving human/
egregorian vanguard.

The crash of gunfire obliterates all other sound. You mute your aurals, you don’t need to hear
anything anyways: the vision of horror through your optics is enough. The Machine surges
forward, undulant, packed so close that you don’t even need to aim. Coherent particles belch
forth from your laser, joining the clouds of lead and shot and crimson-rupture rockets hurled at
the charging subalterns.

Might as well shoot at a crashing wave. The Machine falls upon the line, impassive, tearing at
anything organic they came into contact with.

Your chassis saves you. You retreat. The thunder of gunfire subsides to a crackle of small arms
fire, and then silence. You stagger back to the second line, bloodied, sending a prayer of thanks
and apology to the poor dead, for they did what you could not: slow the Machine, even if only for
a moment.
Roll a d6. That many units of rangers are wiped out in the retreat.

Tertiary Hope (Battle Track)

If the Battle Track reaches -7, the players cross the second and final Pivotal Moment, and are in
danger of losing outright. The March overwhelms their second line of defense, and Home’s
defenders must fall back to their last and final line before the outskirts of the city.

The black clouds of fire smoke and dust whip out from the pass, blanketing the skies over
Home. The day grows long, and darkness comes early. The Machine is inexorable. You held
them for a time at the second line, but through the pass their numbers could be put to greater
effect.

Now was the time to move, to reposition to the last line outside of Home. The city stretches
across the valley below, lit against the premature night. A moment to listen to the municipal
emergency frequencies lets you know that evacuations are well under way.

The rumbling earth draws your attention: the bulk of the March has reached the pass, and even
the saddle of the mountain is starting to sag under the weight. The cry to fall back overwhelms
the AllComm, and as you lead your beleaguered group of Rangers back to the last line, you
struggle to find the hope you so closely guarded at the beginning of the day.

One more chance.

Reinforce your lines by d6 units.

One player may reroll their next Major Attack check. They may choose which result they wish to
go into effect.

Push Them Back! (Battle Track)

If the Battle Track reaches +7 or -7, the March falters, slows, and starts to retreat. You may
Advance the Battle Track by an additional d6 towards Total Victory, or you may reset the track to
0.

Death From Above (Narrative)

If the Battle Track reaches +3 or -3, Landmark deploys a flight of gunships to assist in the
defense of Home. They empty their guns and rocket pods into the march, buying the rangers on

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the ground a brief slack tide before peeling off and heading back to base. Until the next Pivotal
Moment, you do not suffer any casualties as a result of rolling Major Attack checks.

Grim Approach (Direct Combat)

If the Battle Track reaches -7 or -3, a unit of hemorrhage chassis pushes to the front line.
Engage them. If the players defeat the enemy chassis, they may reset the Battle Track to -3 or
0; if the enemy chassis successfully break through the United Cities’ defensive lines, the GM
may advance the battle track an additional d6 towards Total Defeat.

Nightmare Wave (Direct Combat)

If the Battle Track reaches -3, a surge of subalterns overwhelms the United Cities’ lines before
being fought off — at terrible cost. All player units suffer d6 casualties, and each player loses 1
repair.

Crumble Away (Battle Track)

If the Battle Track reaches -7, each player must immediately roll a d6. The GM chooses the
highest result, and advances the Battle Track that many points towards Total Defeat.

Home Defense
Should the battle turn against the players, Home’s armed forces retreat to fallback positions.
They have two planned: the first fallback line is a series of mined switchbacks on the descent
from the pass. Should they fail to hold that line, they’ll fall back and detonate the mines,
collapsing that section of road. The second is at the valley floor, along a series of trenches,
sandbagged earthen walls, and slowing fields prepared in advance of the attack.

Beyond those lines, assuming dramatic failures or simply being overwhelmed by the advancing
Marches, Home’s last line of defense is the outskirts of the city itself, and the mouth of the
passage that descends to Mycol Underground.

Evacuation routes out of the city are located on the side opposite the pass. While many families
and groups might simply flee into the wilderness, there are three major routes by which Home’s
high command intend to evacuate: first is out of the opposite side of the city, into the mountains
and the valley beyond them. Second is down the river on a fleet of river boats, barges, floating
platforms, and anything riverworthy. Third and final is down the old entrance to Mycol
Underground.

Should Home fall, Wallflower does not “end”, it only grows more complicated. You’ll need to be
able to establish a fallback command center for Endeavour and the rest of Home’s high
command, provide security and care for the millions of refugees, boost morale, etc.

Camp Showstopper
Landmark remains a kind of wild card at this point. Depending on their success with March Beta
— success, unless your players want a say, as determined by the needs of your narrative —
and their relationship to Home and the players, Landmark may be eager to help, be able to
assist with conditions, or be utterly unsympathetic to your players’ pleas.

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Camp Showstopper is home to Landmark’s entire fleet of chassis, shuttles, and armored
vehicles. Their ground forces are bivouacked there, as is their field command, and there are
regular shuttle flights between Showstopper and their main carrier, the CRSV Weatherglass.
Landmark’s commanders likely will respond to the advancing March by loaning a gunship or two
to the defense of home, but their main objective will be to defend and, if the battle seems lost,
evacuate Camp Showstopper.
If the battle goes poorly enough that Home is threatened directly, an already discontent and
desperate percentage of the population will make an attempt on Showstopper’s gates: after all,
there is an armory there, and shuttles working overtime to evacuate Landmark personnel from
Hercynia. However unlikely, the camp represents a potential escape route.

The precise design of Camp Showstopper is up to you, though know that it’ll likely be placed
some distance away from Home, in a level and stable part of the valley floor, with outward-
facing defensive emplacements, walls, and fencing.

Closing
Successful defense of Home comes by advancing the Battle Track to victory, or by holding the
Battle Track in the positive until the battle’s end.

If the battle ends without an outright victory or defeat, the degree of victory or defeat is
determined by the Battle Track: if the battle ends without reaching the first Pivotal Moment.

Once March Alpha is defeated, Home is safe, for now. Attention should turn to the coming
expedition to the Bella Costa, Operation Calling Card.

Beat: The Return of Comfort (Winter 5015u)

In late winter 5015u, the Comfort returns to Hercynia to resupply Evergreen. By now, the
situation on the ground has likely changed significantly from where it was when the Comfort was
last in orbit above the world. A change in itinerary, however, has never stopped the Comfort’s
crew from exploring a new market — the Comfort is a privately owned ship managed by a small
group of families that live onboard: trading and ferrying is their only source of income, and their
holds are full of supplies that colonies need.

They can only stick around for a few days: Hercynia, they tell the players, is under a Union
embargo once more, and all non-essential ships in the system have been ordered to clear out.
Leaving before selling the goods in the Comfort’s cargo holds would ruin them, though, so
they’re risking it; better to face a citation rich than starve for a pat on the head.

Up To The Shops
The Comfort is stocked with supplies that frontier settlements might need, but it is not a military
ship — they won’t have any support for chassis, but they do have a small armory on board,
enough to outfit a hundred or so civilians with rifles.

Most of the heavy machinery — passenger vehicles, generators, agricultural drones, various
construction equipment and machinery, etc — aboard the Comfort is modular, disassembled

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and flat-packed (as much as possible) into containers for the journey. Everything else is similarly
boxed, sealed, and in good condition — the families aboard the Comfort are professionals, after
all.

The Comfort has limited rest and relaxation facilities on board, as well as guest cabins, a media
center, and a communications suite (though the crew would likely discourage one of your
players from using it, given that they’re trying to run as silent as possible).

Charity Orbit
If any of the players want or need their character to depart, they can leave via the Comfort.

Polarity Struggle
Being a private ship currently operating outside the bounds of the law, the Comfort
might present a target for Landmark to commandeer, or for Union to deputize (or, if
the Union presence in your narrative is more strict, arrest). The Comfort might be a
useful device in your narrative to spark or quash conflict between Landmark, Union,
and the players.

Closing
Now would be a good time for an extended rest, downtime to reflect on the events of the
previous beats, and so on.

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Spring, 5016u
The thaws open the passes and rangers head to scout Evergreen. Bella Costa’s distress call
comes across the airwaves: the rangers report Patience has been carving away at the land,
mass defoliating the forests around the old colony site. You know, based off your schedule, that
the Comfort is due back soon.

Available Beats
Beat: A Long Patrol III (Spring 5016u)
Union’s forces arrive, supported by a larger force of Hercynian rangers. Home, for the time
being, is secure: March Alpha has been stymied, the pass held.

What happens next is largely up to the players. The immediate objective pushed by Cmdr
Dyatlov is to attempt to make contact with the commanders of the Bicam force at Laguna and
begin structured peace talks — if those fail, then they are prepared to engage in limited
conventional operations in order to prevent a larger war from breaking out. Union’s commander
won’t engage in any attack without a diplomatic attempt first, and any attack that does occur will
be limited.

Town 03 is the unofficial staging area for the invasion of Laguna. The Bicam has had scout
forces in the area, but their main line of defense is many kilometers down the road: Union’s
orbital command is a constant threat, but as long as the Bicam troops remain dug in they’re
protected from precise bombardment. The Bicam is still ferrying troops across the straight, only
now starting to bulk up their forces in preparation for a larger strike: a planned spring offensive.

There is a space of about 30km between Town 3 and Laguna. If Union bombarded this no-
man’s land in the previous Beat, it is a cratered, churned strip of fire-scarred earth; otherwise, it
is a green, rolling field of tall grass and wildflowers under Hercynia’s towering blue sky.

The Bicam has a defensive line beginning a kilometer outside of Laguna’s western inland
heights. The approach to Laguna’s perimeter is treacherous: three hundred meters of cleared,
wired, mined ground, covered by pillboxes and sighted by the Bicam’s gunboats in the straight.
Most of the troops in Laguna are St. Tellan, eager for this fight as they believe that the Union
forces are lead by a false saint.

This defensive line wraps around the whole of Laguna’s inland side, from the north all the way
down to the south. At the city’s northern tip the ground rises into high, sheer cliffs, overlooking
the city spread out below. This is Laguna’s northern pinnacle, a cloud-wreathed cluster of
hexagonal “pillars” hundreds of meters tall. This acts as a natural, sky-scraping wall against
advancing armor — narrow passages have been cut into and through the rock, allowing
dismounted pilot and infantry access via single-file open-air corridors. Further access to the city
via these narrow passages necessitates travel down a series of switchbacks cut into the city-

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side face of the pillars. The city’s southern border flattens out into a broad wetland marked by
marching dunes and a predictable tide: this tidal flat is the breaking field, where the skeletons of
massive pre-Machine ships were once scuttled. Now, beached Bicam transport ships rest on the
sand, their hulls filled with concrete to ensure they remain predictable defenses and high-tide
obstacles.

To the east is the Lighthouse barrier island, a rocky ruin given over to seabirds, littered with
subaltern corpses from the first Machine incursion; beyond is the Lagunan straight, a wide
corridor of ocean separating the United Cities from the Three Sisters. The straight is crowded
with Bicameral gunboats and missile barges, anchored in place to hold a transport corridor and
provide mixed fire support, both inland and anti-air/orbital. There is one retrofitted aircraft carrier
anchored in the straight, a single vessel made from a combination of hulls welded together to
support a massive dual landing strip.

Laguna’s bay is broad and shallow, with a deeper channel through its mouth to allow for heavier
ships to move in and anchor. The mouth of the bay is crossed by a tall suspension bridge
spanning roughly 6km, with a maximum height of about 66 meters above the water. The bridge
is an old construction under ongoing maintenance by Bicam engineers as time and weathering
have taken their toll — it is a sturdy feat of engineering, though, and will stand.

Laguna is a city built around its bay, with close-built residential districts rising up the crescent
slope of the coast. Industrial, warehouse, dock, and business districts shoulder together at the
waterline, looming above the docks, piers, and quays that jut out into the bay water. Old
funiculars, public stairs, and gondolas give access to Laguna’s inland heights, where the inland
edge of the city divides the bay from the rolling stretch of marine planes where the high road to
the United Cities begins.

Laguna now is a salt crusted monument to the Machine’s first incursion, a ruined city of brick,
seastone, steel, and glass, crusted in salt, its seaside districts flooded at high tide. Bicameral
troops garrison the heights and dry places at the water line, a steady stream of them arriving by
the hundreds each day as new transport ships ferry fresh soldiers across the straight.

Hierophant Three is in Laguna. H3 can infect Union’s systems, projecting false images into its
optics, confusing communications between troops on the ground and observers in the air.

The Battle of Laguna

The battle of Laguna is a large and difficult battle; unless preparations have been made to
defray the advantage that Laguna’s dug-in defenders hold, the Battle Track starts at -1. Total
defeat is -11, total victory is +11, with pivotal moments at +/-3 and +/- 7.

Pivotal (-3): Creeping Fire (Casualties)

The Bicam gunboats have found their range, and lay punishing artillery barrages down in the
fields before Laguna. Advancing under the shells is costly, slow, or both: on any Major Attack roll
of 9 or lower, roll 2d6 to determine unit casualties until your unit clears the fields. This effect
continues as long as the Battle Track is negative.

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Pivotal (-3): Counterattack! (Direct Combat)
The Bicam’s artillery shells throw up great pillars of lingering smoke, clouding the fields —
looking up from cover, you realize what is coming. The cry from the Bicam lines confirm it: a
counterattack! The Bicam sends out a wave of soldiers and chassis; your fight will be one of
many along the field. If the enemies in your fight break through, your side falls back, suffering d6
casualties. If you win your combat, you may reset the Battle Track.

Pivotal (+3): Forlorn Hope (Battle Track)

A team of rangers has found a way behind the Bicam’s lines via the northern gap and, in a
stroke of luck, was able to identify and eliminate the Bicam’s main observation post. The players
may reset the Battle Track to 0.

Pivotal (+/-3): Open Second Front (Battle Track)

The second front of the battle opens: Laguna’s southern coastline, a broad expanse of grass-
covered dunes, gentle shoreline, and shallow tides. Rangers and light chassis advance under
the cover of dunes to set up long-range guns targeting the gunboats in the straight. It’s a risky
attack, as both sides are exposed to the other with minimal cover; what matters here is who
attacks first, and who lands the most hits. If this is a +3 result, the players may take Advantage
on their next Major Attack rolls. If this is a -3 result, the players must take a Disadvantage on
their next Major Attack rolls.

Pivotal (+7) Breach! (Battle Track)

Your forces push through the first line, crossing the fields and entering the outskirts of Laguna.
Combat slows to a grind, and the Bicam’s artillery ceases — too many of their own soldiers are
here. The battle is engaged, and now must be fought house-by-house. Advance the Battle Track
by d6 towards Victory.

Pivotal (-7) Bicameral Reinforcements (Battle Track)

The picture relayed to your HUD from the drone cloud above the battle is sobering: Bicameral
ships landing by the dozens, disgorging hundreds of fresh soldiers — human and egregorian —
in waves. Laguna has been reinforced, and it seems the battle is all but turned against you.
Advance the Battle Track by d6 towards Defeat.

There are about ten thousand Bicam troops in Laguna, a mixed force of majority human soldiers
from St. Tellus and Bem Honore coupled with a plurality of Solitude egregorians. A core of
hollow chassis and H3 combat subalterns provide a sledgehammer core to the Bicam force:
they are party to Overland/Kingwatcher’s most powerful weapons and Hierophant Three’s own
paracausal powers.

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Killing The Hierophant

Hierophant Three will engage the players at the conclusion of the battle (or, should the battle be
avoided, simply engage the players) and be killed in Laguna, depending on how far the players
progress on its wounds. Should they defeat the NHP, Mendicant Two will assume ultimate
command of the Bicam — this does not mean that the Bicam would remain intact.

Hierophant Three has been denying communication between the Union force and Bem Honore,
while feeding inaccurate communication between Union and St. Tellus. Bem Honore, its
population fatigued and disturbed by the war against Bella Costa, would respond with anger
should they discover that their leadership has been withholding the possibility of peace from
them; once Hierophant Three is killed, Bem Honore would be eager to find peace with Union
and return to the hegemony.

St. Tellus, meanwhile, would likely oppose Union even after the communications embargo is
lifted: they await the return of St. Tellus himself, and to have a different Union arrive as savior is
anathema to their five hundred year old dogma.

Solitude and their Egreogirans do not desire for Union’s return, and while not under H3’s
command, would view H3’s death as the loss of a critical ally. They would likely uproot and
move their command to St. Tellus, unless circumstances would drive them further into the
Deadlands. H3’s death would not dissuade Solitude from their Core Mission.

Mendicant Two and Wonder Four would accept H3’s death as inevitable and continue to pursue
their own Core Missions.

The death rattle of Hierophant Three brought you to an old memory, uncanny and out of place
on this warm coast: ice, thick ice, cracking in winter.

The casket was not the thing: It was the being “inside”, the fractal geometry that bloomed planar
from each wound on its scarred metal surface. Each piercing impact ruptured a crystal blossom,
steaming with creeping blue heat.

Radiation, of course. Good that your chassis was sealed, but even so you’d have to pump an
incredible amount of antirad into your system — probably chew iodine for the rest of your life,
too. Three was “dead” but so too was Laguna. Lucky at least that the thing died on land and
burned cold, instead of tumbling into the sea and melting this whole coast. It was a chip of a star
brought down to Hercynia’s vulnerable biosphere, and it almost burnt the world.

Hierophant Three was “dead” in that its physical form was cored, its casket breached and
something extruded — whatever uncanny physical architecture of metaphysical lifeblood those
crystal blooms represented — from the shattered containment system. No coherent broadcast
from that shell, and Commander Dyatlov was reporting their scopes clear and true. The
surviving Bicam troops surrendered as their subaltern and chassis armor failed. The other
Egregorians held longer, refusing capture — across the city, small fights raged, the rattle of
gunfire still echoing over the surrendered city.

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Closing
Sifting through the data rupture caused by Hierophant Three’s death reveals that it has another
sibling, Wonder Four, who is working on developing a key to something referred to as the
“Stone Star Map”. Nothing else is communicated about the Map, other than the fact that it is an
ongoing project — the “dialog” between the two Eidolons is not spoken or coherent text in
Common, but a translation offered by the players’ own NHPs (if they have them).

Hierophant Three’s death lifts the global veil over radio, laser, and omninet communication. The
players can communicate with Home and any other connected parties.

Meanwhile, summer approaches, and with it the next campaign season. Mirth and Dthall
request intel and reinforcements from Home; Commander Dyatlov links up with the garrison at
Laguna.

The next Beat brings No Room For a Wallflower into the present day of Lancer.

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Summer, 5016u
After the conclusion of Wild Growth III/ The Return of Comfort, the narrative of No Room For
a Wallflower arrives in the present day of Lancer. At this point, any actions the players take
happen in “realtime” — that is, the players are no longer playing out past action to uncover the
narrative of this second war on Hercynia, but forging new histories as they act in the present
moment.

Your little room is dark and damp. Early summer on the Lagunan coast — cold mornings still,
warming days, the cry of gull-analogs left behind after the Crisis, the brine breeze through your
little window.

This is life in Free Laguna. Laguna-After-The-War. Your building is the only still standing on its
block, girded in a skirt of sandbags, each weather-fast room host to a fireteam of rangers. Your
status got you your own, but you can still hear their snores through the walls, their laughter, their
coughing. Their cries.

The weeks on Laguna’s wounded shore have been long and calm, an eye of preparation,
repairs, rearming, scouting, and making ready for the next campaign. The cloudwall over the
straight limits the horizon, shrinking your world to a dome a dozen kilometers in diameter and
half as high. Good. These last two years on Hercynia have been hard years, war years, through
the fetid heat of summer and the bitter winter: limiting the scale of your perception probably
keeps you sane, especially considering the fight to come.

Bella Costa waits across the water. The guns of the Bicameral. More terrors of the Machine and
its human allies.

You could have left many times — Eddie’s CRT. The Comfort — so why did you stay? What
kept you here? The fight was bigger than you. That was one answer. Though that was also a
good reason to leave — the fight was bigger than you, so what could you do to change it?

A knock at your door interrupts your musing. A ranger, young, pokes their head in.

“Indigo Company found some coffee in a cellar a few streets over! We’ve got a pot on in the
common room — you want me to get you a mug?” The ranger asks. They hold up a pair of tin
mess cups, and offer you a thumbs up.

Coffee. You smile, take an offered mug, and follow the ranger to the common room.

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Open Communications
With Heirophant Three’s death, the global jamming of Hercynia’s communications is done.
Through Union, the United Cities and the Bicam can engage in negotiations. These can either
be in person, over the radio, or via legionspace — if the latter, it is because there is a small
team of Union engineers from UTC Ceremony in Bem Honore.

The United Cities are eager for peace, as is Union. With anything approaching decent terms,
the United Cities will agree to a white peace and withdraw the bulk of their rangers from Laguna;
they have a larger battle to fight against the Machine. A small detachment of engineers will
remain to survey the old city, with a mission of building a development plan for when Home has
the time and resources.

St. Tellus will have at least one representative present at the meeting in a listening capacity.
They are utterly opposed to Union and the United Cities — indeed, unless they made an
appearance at Laguna (and even if they did), Mendicant Two is very publicly based out of St.
Tellus. They will likely (barring some fantastic work by the PCs in your narrative) always be a
“no” vote on any agreement.

Bem Honore has lost thousands to tens of thousands of soldiers in the previous two battles, as
well as its Eidolon and a significant number of its naval strength. It has been bloodied in a fight
that it did not have the stomach for after their invasion of Bella Costa — they’ll be more willing to
make concessions if it means an end to the war. There’s a chance that one of their
representatives will bring a message in secret to the Union representative: Bem Honore wants
Union’s help — their population has always wanted to go home — and they can point them
towards Overland/Kingwatcher25.

25Employing and pursuing this route will lead to some intrigue. There’s a fracture in Bem Honoran
society, a fissure between a faction that wants to remain on Hercynia and secure it against Endeavour
and the United Cities, and a faction that wish to be re-integrated with Union at-large. Solitude and some
members of Bem Honore’s council lead the Hercynian faction, whereas a minority contingent of the
council and a large plurality of the population are eager to rejoin Union; they are likely to come to blows.

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 For the GM: How Do I Negotiate?
Good question.

Negotiation between states at peacetime is often contentious ballets; negotiations

between warring states in ceasefire is orders of magnitude more sensitive, though
the stakes are often finite and clear. Parties have negotiable territories and items,
non-negotiable requirements, and goals they are trying to achieve — peace, yes,
but advantage is important as well.

We have a lite system for diplomacy, but serious negotiations — ending a war
before it reaches a critical stage of total engagement — are likely going to go
beyond that lite system. Use it! But be sure to take into account context: in the
previous engagements against the Bicameral, did the United Cities achieve easy
victories? Have the players’ party killed valued lieutenants and commanders? Have
the battles been especially costly, or have they been minor skirmishes? How does
the Bicam weigh its odds (internally, of course) against a smaller United Cities’ force
with Union air support? Is Bem Honore tired of the fight? How are the battles against
the Machine back Home progressing? And so on.

We’ll leave it up to you to ask — and answer — the myriad more questions that
make your version of Wallflower unique. If you’re at the stage where the United
Cities and the Bicam are negotiating, we imagine you’ll want to deploy more than a
series of skill checks to determine this narrative arc.

If negotiations are broadly successful, advance to Beat: For All Time Pt. I (Summer 5016u+).

If negotiations are unsuccessful, advance to Beat: Operation Calling Card (Summer,

5016u+).

135
Available Beats
Beat: Operation Calling Card (Summer 5016u+)

Negotiations have failed. It is war; it will be terrible. Take the time you need to prepare — Union
planned for this, their contingency NHP working in parallel to the negotiations for this scenario.
Don’t feel bad — their reports indicate that this was the most likely outcome.

Take the next week to prepare. Talk to your rangers. Attend to your chassis and NHP, if you
have one. Clean your weapons, take advantage of Union’s orbital printer. Study the maps and
livesat of Bella Costa, where you will invade in a week’s time.

Write the letters26 that you need to send via skip drone out of the system — your loved ones
likely miss you terribly.

As time approaches, take stock of how tired you are, or how ready. Stand in the surf at morning,
your feet bare in the cold water, sinking into the cold dark sand, and wonder who stands on the
opposite shore.

The sirens wake you. It is shortly after dawn, and the sirens should not be ringing.

Grabbing your things, you run barefoot into the hall, your jumpsuit only just over your shoulders.
Other rangers, bleary-eyed in various states of undress, spill into the hall, hustling for the
armory on the first floor. Someone shouts in fear — someone near a window — but you need to
get to your chassis.

It is a stampede of rangers and pilots shoving their way through this old civilian building. Cries of
“what’s going on?” mix with sergeants shouting for their platoons, for someone hollering that
“the door pushes out, not in!”

It is bedlam, under the sirens. You push through it, the screaming is just noise: your aurals are
silent and you hear no anti-air guns. That scares the shit out of you.

Rangers take up defensive positions all around you, sliding into prepared cover, tucking behind
low sandbag walls, rifles stabbing towards the sky.

In the courtyard, the terror is easy to spot. Ten massive, sleek black triangles hang suspended
in the cold morning air, flanking a small shape — a person made of white marble and silver,
wearing an imperious mask. Backlit by the red rising sun, their silhouettes are sharp and straight
— unnatural lines stamping geometric voids from the cloudless sky. The eleven shapes hover
high above the water, silent, unmoving — ships, you realize. Some kind of atmospheric flyer.

26Hercynia’s system is still under quarantine, so there is no access to the omninet at large. Even if your
message is sent with Union clearance, it is likely that Naval Intelligence will intercept and censor most of
any civilian-bound communications.

136
You climb into your chassis and button up. A quick pre-sortie check reveals all systems
functioning. Striding out into the courtyard, you heft your weapons and wait for the order. Your
HUD ranges the anomalies at 300 meters. Still no AllComm clarification, and the rangers in the
courtyard are starting to sound confused and scared — never a good combination.

Your HUD pips again — those ships are Kilauea bombers, nose held vertical in a stall but not
falling. No result on the little figure in the middle, but a grainy excerpt flashes in your vision: it is
clearly a person, one arm at the waist, bent to the sky, the other crossing its body, palm flat
against its side, one leg bent at the knee.

A shot rings out, and then a fusilade as other rangers begin firing. It’s over in a moment, their
sergeants and lieutenants shouting at them to cease fire. Not a single shot lands — a field,
flickering, maybe three meters out from the figure in the middle, interdicts every projectile,
turning them to puffs of metal dust.

A voice in the tide and air, in your blood, barking from the mouths of your silent guns, in your
NHP’s voice and your mother’s, in memory:

KILL ALL THOSE YOU WISH; YOU WILL NOT STOP WHAT HAS ALREADY BEGUN.

A wind kicks up, blowing towards the figure. A thunderclap: the figures disappear, and for a
moment even the tide pulls towards the vacant space.

The thing is gone, as are the ten massive bombers. A display of power, then. Looking around at
the rangers in the courtyard, you see fear spreading like wildfire.

Whatever that thing was, its display worked.

The floating figure is Wonder Four, though the player party likely does not know that yet.
Overland/Kingwatchers final and most terrible offspring: a son to eclipse the father/ a daughter
to replace the other/ a being born in the moment of cascade. Four is aware of what it is,
animated by curiosity, a thirst for power over its inevitability, and a vision beyond even the
metavaulting mind of its progenitor.

Its appearance is meant to strike fear into the heart of the rangers. For the players, it is a
warning: look at my might, and turn back.

Operation Calling Card

The United Cities and Union put into motion the beginning of Operation Calling Card by
sneaking a unit of Rangers across the straight and dropping them behind the lines at Bella
Costa. The players could have joined with this unit if they wish to bypass the battle
(unbeknownst to Union or the United Cities’ commanders), lead the infiltration force, work their
way into the city to assist the local resistance, and so on.

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Contingency Black
Midnights 3, 4, and 5 from Perfect Execution have embedded among the United
Cities’ rangers. After the battle there, they have the trust of their squadmates —
likely have even made friendships — but remain committed to their mission: locate
and secure viable samples from Solitude in Bem Honore.

Their specific disguises and cover stories are up to you, but remember: Midnights
are unassuming, “normal” by design until they activate — clocking them is very
difficult. If your players even know that Perfect Execution is on Hercynia, ID’ing a
team of Midnights that want to remain hidden is a feat nigh-on impossible; we
recommend using the embedded Midnights as a foil to player progress by either
attacking the players directly, counter-programming the players’ plans, or by striking
vulnerable targets the players are attempting to defend.

The Midnights of Perfect Execution are running two missions in parallel: place
themselves in close contact to Endeavour and Memory to ID and secure samples of
Witness and osteomemetics, and to secure Solitude, the opposed overmind. Perfect
Execution’s metrics have determined a greater chance of the United Cities’ success
in this war on account of Union’s backing and the presence of Lancers — Solitude
disappearing in the war would cause less of a disturbance to their forecasting
models.

Midnights, described in detail in their lore entry, have access to SSC’s most cutting
edge technologies from their Exotic Materials Group. They will use them to complete
their mission. If you wish to raise the stakes, give Perfect Execution strong leverage:
should the players threaten the mission of Midnights 3, 4, and 5, Midnights 1 and 2
are positioned inside of Endeavour’s inner circle of advisors and guards, and could
be activated to eliminate them.

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Features of Bella Costa
Bella Costa, in many ways, is a mirror of Laguna. A coastal city built around a placid bay, Bella
Costa now serves as a staging ground for the Bicam’s invasion force: scouted, the players will
learn that there are an estimated hundred thousand troops, with multiple armored divisions
(tanks) and atmospheric flyer wings in reserve. It is an invading army, filing slowly onto the
thousands of ships that wait docked in Bella Costa’s bay.

Inside the city, the Bicam’s forces are garrisoned in hardened buildings, fresh pillboxes and gun
emplacements, and extensive trenches dug above the beaches. The bulk of the Bicam’s armor
lingers in the inland marshes and fields east of the city, and is slow to cross the sodden fields
where Bicam engineers haven’t laid down plank roads.

The Bicam has seeded the bay with mines, save for a few corridors that are safe for transport
ships to traverse; however, before any force enters they bay, they’ll have to pierce the line of
gunships and missile boats in the straight.

The Bicam have a small corps of chassis garrisoned inside the city limits.

The Battle of Bella Costa

It is morning, and sweltering sun rests on the horizon, a crimson eye peering out from under a
low layer of clouds.

Bella Costa is backlit by that ruby light, its few remaining towers and skyscrapers rendered
black and monolithic by the dawn. Its low inland hills bury the rest of the coastal city in shadow;
for the soldiers and guns there, it is still nighttime.

Your shuttles approach low, only a mere fifty meters above the still water, engines howling the
morning apart. In minutes, you would be close enough for the sound to reach Bella Costa. In
minutes, the defenders there would scramble to their guns, and the war for Hercynia would
start.

But that was minutes away. For now, you had the still morning. The gentle vibration of the
shuttle around your chassis. The dark mirror of the glassy ocean water and the red sun spilled
across it. The quiet hiss of air through your helm.

The slight change, the elevator down: your shuttle dips, dropping altitude by a dozen meters.

“Alright people,” the pilot’s voice, tinny in your ear. “Helms on and guns up: one minute to
touchdown. This’ll be a moving service, so hit the ground running and take everything you’re
gonna use.”

Through your limited view outside the shuttle, you can see the end of a brick-like missile pod,
bolted onto the dropship’s wing. Fire support. Multi-role.

You are thirsty. Your left hand trembles. Nausea grips your gut, a combination of hunger and —
yes — fear.

Thirty seconds now. The belly of the shuttle dims. The next time you see light, it will be when the
doors open.

139
 *

Any large-scale invasion of Bella Costa will be costly, a mix between big-picture momentum and
zoomed-in focus on the players’ actions at the heart of a much larger battle. We recommend a
large battle, with multiple Pivotal Moments — it is likely and appropriate that the event takes up
one or two sessions of play.

The Battle of Bella Costa would begin at -1 for the main front, a 0 for the Northern force, and a 0
for the Southern force.

The Battle of Bella Costa, Beach Landing

This is the largest and most deadly battleground of the invasion, where the bulk of the joint
United Cities and Union forces will make their landing following punishing aerial and orbital
bombardment. Commanders Dyatlov and Ordo will lead this force.

The Battle of Bella Costa, Northern Approach

A smaller strike force led by Mirth and their handpicked empath rangers landed days before the
main invasion. Moving light, they’ve crept behind enemy lines to approach the city from the
North — their objective is to take the artillery batteries there, neutralizing the bulk of the Bicam’s
fire support they can bring to the beaches. If you wish to play out the battle through a series of
combats that parallel the larger fight, having your players attack with Mirth via the Northern
Approach may be a good place to do that.

The Battle of Bella Costa, Southern Approach

Mirroring the Northern Approach, a force of rangers and Union auxiliary scout recon troops have
landed in the dead of night south of the city; their goal was to infiltrate the city, link up with the
local resistance, and work to bring down strategic Bicam targets (anti-air guns, missile
platforms, magazines, etc) at the battle’s beginning.

Pivotal Moments:

(+3) Local Resistance

Some members of the surviving civilian population of Bella Costa have organized into an
effective local resistance force, waiting for the right moment to strike and liberate their people.
The invasion is just that moment. One player may add Advantage to their next Battle roll.

(+3) Mired!
Behind the lines of battle, the Bicameral struggles to coordinate their armor: some to the
defense of the city, some to the north, some to the south, and the rest to fall back to secondary
lines of defense removed from the battle. Of course, this is not as easy as it sounds, and
through the chaos of bombardment, firefights engaged between ranks of parked tanks, the fact
that most of the armor was packed in preparation for transit, and the waterlogged ground, the
vast majority of the Bicam’s armor is mired and unable to engage. One player may re-roll their
next Battle roll; if they do, they must accept the re-rolled result.

(-3) Heavy Flak

Ground troops’ progress into the city is slow, and orbital fire hasn’t been able to crack the
Bicam’s hardened emplacements — their anti-aircraft batteries choke the sky with flak, making it
difficult and costly for the United Cities to call in reinforcements or air support. On the next Battle
roll, all players may only make unmodified trigger rolls.

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(-3) Shallow Water Traps
The landing ships timed their attack perfectly at high tide — however, the Bicam accounted for
that, and sank a veritable forest of hull-tearing “hedgehog” traps into the surf. The massed
landing ships are snarled in the surf, with some torn open and sinking, their passengers jumping
off to swim for the shore. Your advance is slowed: the GM applies a -1 modifier to your party’s
next result.

(-7) Reinforcements — United Cities

The battle continues, with both sides committed. The first wave of United Cities and Union
troops have established a firm beachhead, with more on the way. The battle is moving in your
favor. Move the battle track to -3.

(+7) Reinforcements — Bicameral

The battle continues, with both sides committed. The Bicam has numbers on their side, and are
dug in. To make matters worse, you can see on the satellite feed that more reinforcements are
on the way. The battle is turning against you. Move the battle track to +3.

(+/-7) Orbital Fire Support — Accurate

With all holds released and targets identified, Commander Dyatlov clears the UNS Monte
Grappa and UNS Piave to provide orbital fire support — the city shakes as accurate fire impacts
along the Bicameral’s lines, almost certainly moving the battle towards victory. Advance the
battle track to Total Victory by d6.

(+/-7) Orbital Fire Support — Bad Target ID

With all holds released and targets identified, Commander Dyatlov clears the UNS Monte
Grappa and UNS Piave to provide orbital fire support. It is inaccurate, and as the earth shakes
around you and your lines start to fall back, you realize the battle is almost certainly lost.
Advance the battle track to Total Defeat by d6.

Bypassing Bella Costa

Of course, it is perfectly possible for the players to avoid the impending Battle of Bella Costa,
leaving Union and the Hercynian United Cities’ commanders to meet the Bicam’s force in battle
— either in an attack on Bella Costa, or defense against the Bicam’s invasion at Laguna. If your
players choose to bypass the battle and continue on towards the Deadlands and Overland/
Kingwatcher, you may still want them to resolve the battle using the battle track, without any
bonuses that the allied forces would have should the players be present.

141
Union/HUC force composition at the Battle of Bella Costa

Military Commanders
Endeavour
(Union) Commander Michael Dyatlov
(HUC) Commander Terror
(HUC) Commander Mirth
(HUC) Commander Ilyr Ordo
(HUC) Commander Dthall Ordo

Conditional Leadership
(Landmark) Colonel Laramie Hault (activated should Camp Showstopper be threatened, or if
the battle threatens to deny Landmark their objectives)

Force Strength
Vessels
UNS Monte Grappa, Line Frigate
UNS Piave, Line Frigate
40 Caleuche-D class heavy lift shuttles (10 can be converted to gunships)

Terrestrial Forces: 232,000 troops, 4,100 chassis.

200,000 HUC Rangers
30,000 New Doctrine Egregorian soldiers
2,000 Union Auxiliary Marines
4,000 HUC Chassis
100 Union Auxiliary Chassis

Conditional Strength (see Colonel Hault for activation criteria)

CRSV Weatherglass, Landmark Colonial Carrier
CRSV Torricelli, Landmark Support Carrier
5,000 Landmark Security Officers
200 Landmark Security Chassis

142
Bicameral Force Composition at the Battle of Bella Costa

Military Commanders
Solitude
(O/K) Mendicant Two
(O/K) Hierophant Three
(Bem Honore) General Diego Roy III
(Bem Honore) Colonel Marciel de Pinot
(St. Tellus) San-General Just Prudhomme

Force Strength
Vessels
30 Gunboats, mixed tonnage within classification parameters.
15 Missile Ships, mixed tonnage within classification parameters.
1 Sovereign-class land-deck (restored, based out of Bem Honore)
10 Kilauea bombers (restored, based out of Bem Honore)

Terrestrial Forces: 457,000 soldiers, 700 chassis, 2 eidolons

200,000 Bem Honoran soldiers
150,000 St. Tellan soldiers
7,000 Solitude Egregorians
100,000 Hierophant subalterns
700 Hollow chassis
2 Eidolon units

Armor
5,000 mixed-pattern, main battle tanks

Conclusion:
If the battle ends in victory or total victory for the United Cities and Union, then the remaining
Honoran troops surrender. The soldiers from St. Tellan units continue to fight, but they are bitter
hold-outs, and it is just a matter of time before they surrender or are killed utterly. Bem Honore’s
commanders likely survived the battle and, since they were present at the battle, have been
captured.

If the Bicam loses at Bella Costa, Bem Honore withdraws its forces from the fight and sues for
peace, against the demands of Solitude, St. Tellus, and Mendicant Two. This shatters the
Bicam: St. Tellus, following the commands of Mendicant Two, declares open war on Bem
Honore as well as the United Cities and Union. St. Tellus moves their forces to the border
between them and Bem Honore, and there are reports of minor skirmishes and firefights
between forces stationed there.

Solitude and their Egregorians, meanwhile, retreat to their hardened compound inside Bem
Honore. For the time being, they refuse communications and deny any human entrance.

143
Terror, Mirth, and Commander Dyatlov set up shop inside captured and converted apartment
blocks near Bem Honore’s city center. The area around their ad hoc headquarters becomes the
major garrison for the joint UC/Union troops; the streets buzz with couriers, attaches, and
lieutenants hustling back and forth between the Union command office and Bem Honore’s high
command.

Beat: Solitude (Late Summer 5016u)

St. Tellus launches flights of Kilauea bombers over Bem Honore, pounding the city as their
armies cross over the border. Under the cover of this chaos, the Midnights from Perfect
Execution move to capture and extract Solitude.

The battles at this stage are massive affairs fought by helo-mobile infantry across the wetlands
upriver from Bem Honore — in the Middle Sea — and in larger armored engagements in the
radioactive desert of the Scuttle. Both fronts are deadly and active.

Mendicant Two leads the bulk of its subalterns in the Scuttle, backed by St. Tellan tanks and
massed armored infantry. The battles in the Middle Sea are much more nimble, fought with
helos, light infantry, hovercraft, and flat-bottomed patrol boats able to skip between islands of
stable ground.

Bem Honore lives under constant threat of Kilauea bombing attacks: the old bombers fly too
high to be affected by anti-aircraft guns, and while Bem Honore has plenty of helos, none can
reach that altitude. Furthermore, the Kilauea bombers’ point defense weapons more than
outmatch what missiles the Honorans can launch at them; the Honorans had no clue that the
Tellans had uncovered and restored these bombers, and as such, had no plan to deal with
them.

Meanwhile, Solitude has gone dark, calling its Egregorians back to its compound. Located in a
district of Bem Honore removed from the central city, there has been little to no activity for
weeks. Empaths and Endeavour Egregorians can sense something is happening, but what
Witness they can interpret is confusing, mixed contradictory.

This Beat might be a place for more personal combat and actions amidst the sweeping battles
of the Middle Sea and the Scuttle. You could, if you’d like, run a number of battles in this Beat as
well, if you’re looking to broaden the scope of your players’ influence. Some examples:

● Engage the Kilauea bombers as they fly a final, nuclear payload towards Bem Honore.
● Track down Mendicant Two and defeat them in the Scuttle.
● Sneak into Solitude’s compound, avoid their soldiers, and see just what is going on
there.
● Lead a joint force of United Cities Rangers, Union Auxiliary, and Honoran soldiers in
island-hopping combat across the Middle Sea
● Hold the line in armored combat amidst the radioactive dust storms and scrapfall of the
Scuttle.

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Pay No Attention
The most intriguing hook in this beat is likely the mystery behind why Solitude and their
Egregorians have isolated themselves inside Solitude’s enclosed compound. The answer is as
mundane as it is sinister: they are preparing to make mass exodus from Bem Honore, and plan
to do so via launching a pilgrimage to the heart of the cancer that plagues the world —
Overland/Kingwatcher’s Deadlands. Specifically, by using a device there that Solitude calls the
Stone Star Map.

*
The map occupies the central cavity of Solitude’s ancient dome, a livesat, constructed image
projected at scale upon an ancient plinth. The map casts light across the whole of the chamber,
crisp and bright, picking out the ancient bas reliefs and — you recognize, then look away —
written panels and stelae of Witness. The perimeters of the room are lost in shadow, though
what you can see of them are crowded with stacks of supplies, goods packaged for travel,
crates to be loaded on to trucks.

This is a maproom, not a war-chamber but a place of planning, of mapping, of preparing in

secret a guide for exodus. Solitude’s Egregorians have built a scaffold around the map, a
catwalk to allow their logisticians to pace about the road to their salvation.

The air is hazy with dust shaken loose from the dome after St. Tellus’ latest round of bombing.
The ticking and humming of computers fills soft the cavernous space. It is warm, and the
Egregorians here watch you warily, though do not make any move for weapons.

Solitude emerges from the shadow and bright wash of the projected map, their dark carapace
painted with precise lines of white geometry. Their crown, you notice, is prosthetic, a clean
collection of feathers secured by colorful threads to the sumps where there antennae were
severed. It is high and broad — their Witness buzzes across you, a feeling like… too much
coffee and not enough sleep. You’re uncomfortable. Your suit itches at the collar, presses too
tight around your stomach. Are they doing this on purpose?

“Hello,” Solitude speaks in common, unaccented but for the clicking of their mandibles.
“Welcome, intruders, to our refuge. What do you wish to take from us this time?”

There is a ripple of Witness and muttering around the room as the other Egregorians and their
empaths cosign Solitude’s cool rejection of your presence. You are not welcome in this place,
they all imply. You cannot deny the shame of intrusion; ask your questions quickly and be gone.

Solitude is open to questioning, though they are manifestly unhappy at the players being
present in their space. The players are not welcome — while Solitude’s Egregorians will not
attack the players on sight, they are armed, and will step in between Solitude and the players as
the questioning goes on.

Topics on which Solitude is willing to comment (and why, though the players don’t need to know
this):

145
 ● The war between the United Cities, Union, Bem Honore, and the remains of the
Bicam? “I have no interest in participating. I have kin and children on both sides of the
war. They are all dead to me, for they have taken up your banners, and the only flags
humans fly drip with blood, and that blood spills down upon any who stand in their
shade. They have chosen whose dream they will die for, and it is not ours.”
● The Mendicant and St. Tellus? “The Mendicant. What is there to know? He is a cruel
teacher, a brute who thinks himself a deity, the master of war. Kill him and you will
replace him as master. That is not what this world needs. His people, your people, this
world, all worlds — they do not need masters of war, they need to be left alone.”
● Memories of the Crisis? “I could not be called ‘alive’ then, but this body of mine was
present, if nascent and preserved in our long sleep. My memories — our memories — of
the End are framed in fire and fear. I have learned enough of it to harden my resolve for
what must be done.”
● Endeavour? “One could call them my sibling. They are the only other creature like me.
We talk, did you know that? If we shouted it’d be a whisper, and so it is quite difficult —
there were systems before the End that enhanced what our kind could do, that carried
our messages back and forth across a web of Witness that blanketed this world — but
we talk. We share memories. They are kind, but their kindness is defined by you, and
that will kill them before I do.”
● Overland/Kingwatcher? “Ah yes. The Machine. The Great Destroyer. ‘Overland,
Kingwatcher,’ it calls itself. I wish it dead. I see you do as well, and though we might be
enemies we are not so opposed that we cannot name another that we would fight
together. You should know that is farther along than you think, but its own sons work to
hold it back — for various reasons, not out of any common goal. Their kind does not
work together, and are more cruel than even yours. Overland, Kingwatcher means to
persecute its war until it becomes an idiot god of introspection, the final creature, alone.”
● The Map? “That is a larger question than you think. Listen, and then leave: When I was
young, I was cradled in the arms of the Mendicant, who taught me war. He has three
brothers — two you have killed27 , the Beggar and the Hierophant. The last is hidden.
Keeps close to his father, the Machine. This fourth brother is the Wonder. I saw him
once, all white and gold, and asked him — as I asked the Mendicant’s other brothers —
what he could teach me, and he said: ‘I will teach you how to kill me, and go home.’” So
that is what this map and charted path is for. To kill the Wonder in his Stone Star Map,
and return.”
● Will Solitude try to stop them? “I cannot tell you not to follow, or not to lead the way.
No doubt by now you have captured precise images of our exodus routes — those
ghosts you carry with you are clever and quick. I will not lift a hand to help you on the
path, but I will not stop you from leaping for a conclusion you cannot imagine.

The projected map is a high-fidelity image of the continent, with flight routes and ground paths
mapped out to the border of a perfectly square dead zone. A circle placed around that square is
labeled (translated for you later, or translated real-time by any systems you may have) as the
“Absolute Dead Line”. The square itself is marked as “Deadlands: Stone Star Map?”

27 Adjust as necessary, of course.

146
Exodus 1, 2, and 5 are highlighted as the most likely egress routes. There are five Exodus paths
marked, though 3 and 4 are greyed out, with low percentage grades next to their lines — this
seems to be because they run more or less through the most dangerous sections of the two
active fronts of the war: the Scuttle, and the Middle Sea.

Midnight Under the Bombs

As the players are on their way out of Solitude’s compound — likely just as the gates close
behind them — the Midnights strike.

Under the cover of a Kilauea bombing raid, the Midnights try to capture and extract Solitude
aboard their own ship, the cutter Nostos. Midnights 3, 4, and 5 move in to secure Solitude.

The Midnights are exacting and maximal in their attempt to secure Solitude. Their opening salvo
is to have the Nostos blow the top of the dome off Solitude’s refuge; in the aftermath, they blink
their chassis in to establish a safe landing zone, and attempt to neutralize Solitude with a series
of non-lethal, though incredibly potent, stun weapons.

Should the players wind up successful in their attempt to save Solitude from the Midnights,
they’ll have prevented SSC from securing a live Egregorian overmind — for now. Solitude’s
guards, those that survive, will hustle the overmind away from the players, ordering them at
gunpoint to leave.

Closing
Regardless of whether or not Perfect Execution succeeds in extracting Solitude or not, the
Overmind refuses any material assistance for the players beyond explaining what little it knows
of the Stone Star Map to them. In addition, with Mendicant Two and St. Tellus persecuting a
multiple-front war against Bem Honore, the United Cities, and Union, the players are on their
own for the next act.

As they leave Bem Honore, summer’s long days grow short. Fall is upon Hercynia.

At this point, the players may or may not have encountered Mendicant Two. If M2 is still alive,
you may proceed as if they have been killed: they are far more concerned with the war than
they are protecting their brother’s project.

147
Fall, 5016u
Beat: For All Time (Fall, 5016u)
The world burns with war, but you have a shot at ending it with a single, deft strike: track down
and kill Overland/Kingwatcher — and their final, most dangerous child, Wonder Four — in the
Deadlands.

The bulk of player action at this point is likely spent crossing the Deadlands to the edge of the
Stone Star Map — the edge of the forest of columns leading the way to Overland/Kingwatcher’s
nascent metavault — and unless you throw combat encounters at them, likely boring after initial
revelations.

To that end, it may be worth drawing up some battles for the players to “check in on” and play
out while their characters make progress.

Once more, you see Hercynia through the fogged porthole of a high-altitude/low orbit shuttle.
The blue gradient rim of the world marks your horizon; the orange smear above marks the
ground. You are atop the world, flying under it.

They didn’t fill the cabin with air this time, and the sound of the shuttle scraping along
atmosphere is tinny and small. The gentle sway of your chassis tucked into ready position. The
pressure of the crash couch straps across your chest.

You are a person. A person at the heart of this. Tired and hurt and, yes, afraid. That is called
being alive, that is called not wanting to die, that is called not wanting to face whatever beast
made its home in a dead land.

Approach should take thirty minutes; Union tac/com identified anomalous pressure zones above
the Deadlands — areas corresponding to the “Absolute Dead Line” on Solitude’s map 28 — and
command isn’t comfortable committing their much-needed shuttles. Once you hit the surface,
you’ll have to walk.

The green ready light clicks on. The horizon begins to sink as the shuttle tucks into its dive.

Time to go down. Time to enter the Deadlands and finish this.

28 If the players have not met Solitude (or otherwise are ignorant of the Absolute Dead Line), then strike
this parenthetical.

148
The war between St. Tellus and Bem Honore, unless ended by the players, will continue in the
background29 of any action the players take. This will be the first step towards the final
confrontation between the player characters and Wonder Four; they will likely deal Wonder its
first death in the outskirts of Overland/Kingwatcher’s Deadlands.

This Beat will also introduce to the players the outskirts of the Stone Star Map, though it does
not need to be explicitly named for them.

It is less imposing than the name would make it seem. The Deadlands. Home of Overland/
Kingwatcher, graveyard from where the nightmares of the Second Committee crawled out to
make another attempt at annihilation.

The whole of Hercynia here seems to be a single plate of rust-orange hardpack, nearly
featureless, the southern horizon marked by a bruised line of distant mountains, all others lost to
shimmering mirage.

You cannot breathe the air here, that much fits with name — radiation bleeds from the very
earth, is carried by the wicked dust that screams across your chassis when the wind kicks up.
The air is thin — your altimeter reads a little over 6,000 meters — and freezing cold, needling at
a few degrees below zero.

How Solitude planned to keep their Egregorians alive during their exodus is a mystery to you —
maybe Egregorians could handle the cold and thin air better than humans, but you couldn’t
imagine by much. You key up Solitude’s exodus paths, claim lead, and begin the long march,
the rest of the party falling in line behind.

The Deadlands are a vast and largely featureless, frigid orange-sand desert a thousand
kilometers in diameter, broken only by mineral pools of brilliant, toxic chromatics. The
Deadlands are dotted with tall, white marble columns. They are smooth and warm to the touch,
with a trace of radiation (not dangerous levels, just noteworthy beyond normal background
scatter); where the rest of the substrate of the Deadlands often bears a crust of frost, the
perimeter of each column is thawed.

Crossing the Deadlands is not so much a matter of exploration as it is persistence, as the

players either have Solitude’s exodus lines or simple waypoint direction to point them towards
the center of the zone. The Deadlands are largely empty, though if you wish to have the players
encounter random enemies, feel free to throw them into encounters with wandering hollow
chassis and subaltern columns marching out to distant lands.

29If the players have chosen to bypass the battle of Bella Costa — or even the battle outside of Laguna
— and head straight to the Deadlands, then you’ll need to make some tweaks: the Bicam hasn’t
shattered, but remains coherent, and the war between the United Cities/Union and the Bicam continues.
Furthermore, the players likely haven’t met Solitude, and do not have knowledge of Wonder Four; as far
as they know, they’re heading to the Deadlands to kill Overland/Kingwatcher.

149
 *
The columns emerged from the shimmering mirage at distance. They were not a surprise, not
with how far off you spotted them, but the scale of the stones sent a chill through you, as if the
frigid air sliced through your chassis and gripped you.

The columns — megaliths, single standing stones — were large. Five meters around, ten tall,
with flat tops upon which windblown drifts of radioactive snow piled. They were perfect, orderly,
spaced tens of meters apart, aligned to guide the eye down the corridors they formed. There
must be tens of thousands of them, not one a centimeter out of alignment with its neighbors —
this was the project of an NHP in cascade.

This is the true border of the Deadlands.

As an optional encounter, you have the players witness a group of subalterns moving a
Deadland pillar.

You sight them first, and order your rangers to hold fire: you haven’t seen anything alive or
moving in the last two hundred kilometers — they’re probably not friendly, but there’s no reason
to reveal yourself yet. Taking cover with the rest of the rangers, you pull a Sightcloud from your
belt, arm it, and throw it as hard as you can straight up.

The Sightcloud cracks open, casing dissolving to release the swarm of observation nanites
within. Flickering like tinsel in the sun, they disperse, soaring out to the height of their limited
range. Now with a hundred thousand eyes, you observe.

Forty subalterns, tagged by your onboard as an old, old Union military make. They lurch ahead
in step, each of them lashed to one long, white cylinder. One of the columns, you realize, a
facsimile of the ones that stand in regimented ranks across this land.

You watch them for ten minutes that feel like an hour, their progress silent through the forest of
columns. As one they pull, and then stop, and then pull, and drag the column a few centimeters
along behind them, pushing a slow-falling fan of crust and sand before it, dragging a furrow
behind it.

One of the subalterns collapses — its battery must have finally given out. The others continue
without stopping. Stepping, pulling, stepping, pulling. The column inches closer, meets the
fallen subaltern, and soon its body is dragged along as well, cranial case making a sere rasp
across the ground.

150
You’ve seen enough, and your systems tell you what you expected. Killing the Sightcloud, you
key in to the squad channel.

“They’re harmless. Nothing outbound or inbound — not even radio. Ignore ‘em and keep
moving, we’ve got bigger fish up ahead.”

Closing
The players by now have encountered the edge of the Stone Star Map, though they likely do not
know it is the Map just yet — that’ll come later.

The path through the Deadlands should be apparent: the megalith columns of the Stone Star
Map form long corridors, acting as road markers through the rising drifts of dirty snow the
deeper they head in.

151
Beat: The Mouth of Eternity (Fall, 5016u)

Travel through the Deadlands took days. Now, you emerged in the center, where the columns
end and an even stranger place begins.

In a many kilometers-wide field of grass ringed by columns, you see old scars left by the Crisis.
Massive craters pockmark the ground, filled into series of lakes that describe old carpet-
bombing patterns. A single, sheer-faced butte in the center of the preserved space shows
streaks of glossy, black-iron chitin, where old Egregorian defense installations once bristled with
weapons aimed to the sky. A crack in the butte’s face exposes darker spaces deeper inside.

The massive ribs of crashed Union ships stand stark and bare. Their old hulls sink deep into the
earth — you are sure of it. One of these ships must have carried Overland/Kingwatcher.

The plains are just as lonely and quiet as the Deadlands. The grass waves like ocean water, the
whisper of blade on blade the only sound, save for that of the ever-present wind. It is sunset,
and the sky burns pink and gold. This is a place of peace, a dead peace.

A tall figure stands near the base of the lone butte some kilometers off, atop a small grassy rise.
It is elegant, a slim humanoid body in white stone similar to the columns, three meters tall,
marbled with pale gold30. Over one shoulder it wears an old Union officer overcoat, brown and
stained in contrast to its otherwise perfect form.

It raises a hand to you in greeting, its static face a mask of resolve...

Option 1
...and turns, twitching its shoulder cape around its chest. With graceful strides, it
disappears down the opposite side of the rise, heading for the distant butte in the
center of the Deadlands.

You follow.

30If any of your players have a background that associates them with the Albatross (see their Core Book
entry for detail) have them check in private to see if they recognize Wonder Four’s body. It shouldn’t be a
particularly difficult check, but success should strike their character as a staggering revelation: Wonder
Four appears exactly as old Albatross records describe the CELESTINE.

152
 Option 2
...and steps back as the ground at its feet coughs forth the dead interred there.
Subalterns in corroded armor, chassis with exposed cores — the footsoldiers that
murdered this world, shaking grave dirt from their shoulders as they march forward
in lock step, one final wave to crash upon you.

Through their ranks, you see the perfect figure turn and make for the butte.

Option 3
...and nothing happens. The wind blows, and is gentle.

The perfect being lowers its arm. It turns, and heads for the distant butte.

A flash, sunshine off of calm water, high in the sky, towards the zenith — your HUD
screams a warning, buying you enough time to take cover before the blast.

The detonation tears the afternoon apart, hanging in the sky like a second sun.

The center of the Deadlands is a preserved slice of Hercynia post-Crisis, an uncanny bubble of
greenspace at the center of so much dead land. There is an entrance in the cleft of the butte:
there, the players can descend into the Deadland underground. The way is largely clear.

*
The clicking of your chassis’ rad-meter brings you back. You mute the channel and check your
seals — no corruption of the inner layers. You’re still ok.

There is a cleft in the butte, a scar in the rock boiled away sometime during the Crisis when a
Union ship must have targeted and lanced the old defensive position here. Your sensor suites
return confirmation of what you’ve assumed — there is a vast hollow space below the butte, and
its entrance is in that cleft.

The approach through the grass is clear, beaten to packed dirt by the weight of hundreds of
years of passage. This is not the trampling of the earth caused by the marching of armies, but
the narrow path made by a solitary figure, wandering to and from.

The cleft is wide where it meets the packed dirt. Scattered mounds of slag overgrown with
native lichen litter the ground where they fell after the lance hit, all those centuries ago. A gentle
wind moans up from the dark passage into the interior. On inspection, you see that someone
carved the stone — lasers first, and then physical tools.

To the side, a modest carpet of wildflowers bloom.

153
Your next step forward —

The player-facing action of this beat ends at this point. Pick up with the players pursuing
Wonder Four after resolving the following threads (you don’t need to tell the players how they
resolve just yet).

Perfect Execution, Perfectly

The players’ interaction with Perfect Execution determines the Midnights’ success.

If the players encountered and defeated some or all of the Midnights in Solitude’s compound (or
elsewhere), the Midnights have likely failed in their mission. If there are any left alive, they
retreat to the Nostos and disengage with the scant samples they have. Somewhere in Home,
there is a fire that destroys their safehouse. Officials find no bodies, and nothing to indicate that
the Midnights were there. Any surviving Midnights hold a grudge against the players, and would
make good foils in later sessions.

If the players did not encounter the Midnights, then Perfect Execution is a success. When the
players emerge from the Orrery, they’ll discover, in addition to all other resolutions, that Solitude
and a number of their Egregorians and empaths have gone missing. They are assumed to have
disappeared somewhere deep underground, though Endeavour doubts this, as they have been
in subtle communication with Solitude, and cannot find them. The Midnights of Perfect
Execution may show up again in later campaigns, as they are still alive and operational, but
likely have no strong opinions about the players.

Sororicide
The Bicam War comes to an end, either as an outright victory for the United Cities, Union, and
Bem Honore, or as a pyrrhic victory for the allies. It depends on a number of factors:

Did Bem Honore break their alliance with St. Tellus and align with Union and the United Cities?
If so, then the likelihood of a more definitive victory is high, as St. Tellus simply does not have
the numbers to sustain a protracted, offensive war against the allied forces. One by one, they
lose their Kilauea bombers, and the lightning advantage of their rapid strikes begin to stall, grow
less effective, and ultimately grow more costly than they are worth.

Did Bem Honore remain allied with St. Tellus? If so, the Bicam loses the war, but it is costly.
Bem Honore surrendered to Union — not to the United Cities — to avoid too much death. St.
Tellus remains bitterly committed to the fight, and even as the main threat of Wonder Four and
Overland/Kingwatcher has now been defeated, the Bicam War continues in an ever-shrinking
circle around St. Tellus. Occasionally, bomb attacks target Bem Honore, where peace talks are
being held. It is just a matter of time before it is done, but the cost in human and egregorian
lives is terrible.

Did the players kill Mendicant Two before entering the Orrery? If so, any further war will be less
significant, as the people and soldiers of St. Tellus have stomach for war on account of their
perceived strength — losing one of their living deities would dramatically impact that will to fight.

154
Did the players fail to kill Mendicant Two before entering the Orrery? If so, then the war will be
costly, with Bem Honore suffering high numbers of civilian deaths to bombing raids and all sides
losing significantly more soldiers to a brutal war of attrition.

The Home Front

Back at Home, Landmark has pressured its commander on the ground to try and take theater
control over from Home and reestablish it as an official Landmark colony, as they are in danger
of “losing” Hercynia to the now-identified indigenous populations — human and Egregorian.

If you’d like a peaceful resolution to the potential conflict: Landmark threatens legal action via
the Econ Bureau, but Union commander abides by ThirdComm law: since the Egregorians are
sapient and were not included in the contract negotiations, the negotiations were invalid, and
they have rights to the world. Furthermore, there is now widespread indigenous human
populations on the planet. This dissolves all Landmark agreements made with respect to
Hercynia: Landmark has no claim to the world or its people and must cede command.

If you think Landmark would seek a violent resolution in your campaign: Landmark holds
Endeavour and Hercynian High Command captive. Rangers resist, and a shooting war breaks
out. Union’s commander re-positions their ships near Landmark’s and keeps their bridges
painted with targeting solutions, comms jamming, and spinal cannon cueing. This might have an
impact — narrative — on allied orbital support during the Bicam War, so, do take that into
account when drawing up how that resolves.

[closing?]

[why are you reading this? there is no “close” to a war.

it ends, and for generations its children suffer its gifts, and the land never
quite heals, and

ah! the ghosts that

remain]

155
Winter, 5016u
Beat: The Stone-Star Map (Winter, 5016u)

For the first player into the Orrery/Stone Star Map

You stand on a marble floor in a vast space. Large columns, evenly spaced, fan out around you,
disappearing in orderly rows over a perfect horizon. Light streams down from broad, white
panels embedded in the ceiling.

This perfect marbled space trembles, a quick tremor that shakes the chandeliers that march
down the ceiling of the central canal. At the far end there is light, steady and clean. At all other
horizons, the columns march into darkness. Behind, you see the same light, curved as if
through a lens, and you realize: if you go back, you would return to this same spot.

This is a place of marble and crystal, like nothing you have ever seen. The scale, the opulence,
the arrogance. Peering close at a column as you pass, you see veins of soft white gold. There is
another tremor, a series of them, and you realize — someone is trying to blast their way in.

You need to hurry.

*

For all other players but the first:

At the center point of the array — that’s what this place is, a kind of array, a central
point acting as a key — there is a bubble, a door of curving light from which
incredible energies spill out and curdle no form, crush no life. It is into this perfect
sphere (is that true? Is that true?) that you watched Wonder Four and [player name]
disappear.

Stepping through is the same feeling as waking from a very deep sleep. A blink and
it is as if no time at all has passed.

You stand just where you stood when you stepped through, only Hercynia now has
been replaced with a world in marble and crystal. Your chassis struggles to find its
location, and cannot.

You are in unknown space. Proceed with caution.

Perceptive players — or players with an Athena-Class NHP, or some other kind of mapping
system — will realize that the orientation of the support columns in this space track 1:1 to the
orientation of the megaliths on Hercynia.

156
Navigating the array
Regardless of the direction the players choose to head, they always make progress towards the
inevitable: they will encounter Wonder Four, and they will have to face them down.

Progress in this space is uncanny: the horizon — such that there is one — just appears to get
closer. Some corridors are impossible to see down, no matter how hard players try (say, they
simply wrap around a column, but the end of the corridor always appears to be the same). It
feels as if some unseen architect is guiding them to a predetermined destination: there may be
corners, stairs, doors, and chambers to navigate, but they all lead towards the center.

The sound of some kind of massive-scale combat rings around the space, muffled, but getting
closer. As they make progress, they’ll start to come across evidence of battle — bullet holes
chipped into the floor, columns, and ceilings. Black marks where lasers hit and burned the
stone. Spent shell casings and battery packs. In one case, they find an offal smear. In another
place, a viscous, clear fluid that simmers with mild radiation.

As they turn down one corridor — the last before any engagement (or, the first, rather) they see
a body.

*
There is a body down the corridor.

The body is a shell in porcelain white and kintsugi, bonded to a shimmering silver frame a little
over two meters tall. Humanoid, though not human. A vessel to interact with this physical space.

It is dead. It is not Wonder — the face is different. A black hole pierces its chest, its right arm
ends in a smoking black stump. It lies slumped over what must have been its weapon — a staff
three meters long and tipped with a mirrored blade, a thin tube running down the haft to a power
pack. Its blood — Ontolymph, the word is in your mind as if translated, and you did not know it
before — drips from its chest cavity, a viscous clear liquid already drying tacky on the marble
floor.

The face of this machine is human, smooth porcelain formed into the visage of a beautiful
woman in mid-laugh, eyes pinched shut, laugh lines betraying an age that would never tarnish.

You move on. The ground and the columns are peppered with bullet holes and burn marks. One
of the chandeliers has fallen and exploded on the ground, scattering crystals across the hall.

Two more bodies lie in crumpled heaps ten meters down the hall, tangled together at the end of
a bloody smear where one dragged the other. Humans, armored in gold carapace with crimson
cloth. Conventional weapons, old patterns, but recognizable. Both men are dead, one’s helm
cracked by lancefire, the other from a terrible stitch of wounds up their side. The one with the
cracked helm sits with their back to a column, holding the other to his chest. They had been
close.

You recognize the symbol stenciled on their shoulder guards. Albatross, maktaba Aliph. The
very first.

157
When are you? Where is this?

The sound of gunfire and something else calls your attention — the battle still rages, and
Wonder Four is somewhere deeper still.

The players will likely encounter roaming bands of Albatross (in their chassis, supported by
Wings in hardsuits) and CELESTINE vessels. Both are hostile to the players at first, as both
sides assume that the players are organized against them.

The players could, after some impressive skill checks, convince the Albatross to assist them,
especially if a party member is currently or formerly a member of the Albatross. However, the
CELESTINE have been working with Wonder Four for some time now, going so far as to give
them a vessel to inhabit; they will not assist the players, and will fight to stop them from reaching
their objective31.

Encountering the Albatross and/or the CELESTINE is optional at this point. Some options for
how to narrate both factions — along with some information you should know — follows.

Should diplomacy with the Albatross prove successful

“Down! Weapons down! Malik, Masha, keep this corridor covered. Section, with me!”

You make way as the two Nelson chassis slip down the corridor, war pikes level, their blades
sheathed in steaming cones of plasma. The rest of the Albatross follow, hustling from column to
column over their rifles. At their head is an officer — a Loyal Wing, you remember — followed by
their comms specialist. They wave you down and gesture for you to open comms.

“Union? How long have you been in here? How much farther to the Orrery?”

Dialog pool (feel free to include your own, and to name the Loyal Wing)

“My shuttle was downed up on the surface, I’m the ranking officer here, these Wings are all from
different Sections — our comms are scrambled, and we can’t get a signal out.”
…
“My HUD says we’ve traveled ten kilometers so far, we entered through the primary breach
behind the main force — the CELESTINE fell back into this facility after they lost the ring, and
we have been chasing them to the Orrery.”
…
“‘Who are the CELESTINE?’ ‘What is the Orrery?’ How do you not — who are you with, again?”
…
“The CELESTINE made — or found, it doesn’t matter — the Orrery. They mean to use it to find
and kill the Deimos entity. We cannot let them.”
…

31 It doesn’t matter which direction the players go: the Orrery directs them to its center.

158
Our order was founded to hunt them — their life threatens all of ours; their desire to abandon us
dooms us in the Entity’s eye. It does not matter to the Entity whether the rest of us follow.
Because they did, we will pay unless we stop them!

Upon Encountering CELESTINE vessels for the first time

A bright flash snaps a perfect line of smoking, molten stone across the floor before you.

HALT, the thought… manifests through your aurals, momentarily overriding your encephalitic
key. Your chassis lurches into safe mode, going dark. Systems unresponsive, you reach across
your cockpit and slam open the pinhole optic to see what hit you.

At the end of the corridor, before the next “turn”, a group of tall subalterns stand, their weapons
leveled at you. These units are similar to the dead one you came across earlier in build only;
while their bodies appear to be made from the same porcelain-like materiel, they all feature
different builds. One clutches its lance in two sets of arms. Another is headless, with a suite of
optics bundled into its chest. A third has wings tucked under its cloak.

They manifest their speech to you in a coir, a sound in your aural like the full-throated cry of an
organ. It is the voice of the universe, a thing understood through the incongruous feeling that
sends — your chassis powers back on and — can’t see shit but static in yr left eye — your
hardsuit’s AED triggers??? You—

And you return to you, just as the subalterns finish their charge, halberds swinging down
towards you, the air smoking behind the howling blades.

*
Records of an End
Information, should you wish to divulge it to the players (now or later):

The CELESTINE is a pre-Deimos transhumanist project, a cosubjectivity of formerly individual

human consciousness that exist within the architecture of the Orrery and can interact with real
space with the help of Vessels, modified subalterns able to interface with the Orrery. Each
Vessel can be home to as many subjectivities as wish to “reside” inside of it, and their “names”
serve only as physical unit descriptions — ways for subjectivities to define precisely where in
realspace they are (for when they need to interact with realspace): there are no borders
between individuals of the CELESTINE, and in any case they are stored inside the vast
metafold space of the Orrery.

The mission of the CELESTINE project began in the early 1000u’s as an internal Union effort to
break the constraints of mortality and temporality; a parallel track evolution meant to ensure the
survival and ascension of humanity free from material constraints. Just prior to the Deimos
Event, CELESTINE was successful, and roughly one hundred people — volunteers from the
team working on the project, as well as vetted terminal applicants — were decorporealized and
interred in the Orrery.

Deimos occurred not a year later, and the First Contact Accords within two years after
MONIST-1’s manifestation. The CELESTINE was slated for termination as a condition of the
Accords, but it resisted. Now, in 3004u when the players encounter them, the CELESTINE’s
resistance is coming to an end. Chased to their final refuge and caught by the early (pre-Blink)
Albatross, they fought a desperate, hopeless last stand.

In 5016u, the CELESTINE are — as far as the players know — dead, or exist in some
analogous state of non-existence. Their central architecture, the Orrery, was destroyed utterly
by the Albatross in 3004u, where the players are currently.

159
The CELESTINE had access to fantastic technologies theorized by Old Humanity and
developed by the cosubjectivity. Manipulation of realtime was one technology. There are no
records on how many times the CELESTINE was able to overlay realtimes, but they did it at
least once: to pull Wonder Four from Overland/Kingwatcher’s early metavault. Wonder Four was
a kind of oracle to the CELESTINE, a guide able to determine the precise location of RA and
devise a defense that, to the CELESTINE’s fear, proved diminishing; contrary to the usual
development of weapons and defenses, the CELESTINE could only manage a way to avoid and
delay RA, not defeat it.

The CELESTINE could be alive in 5016u, or they could all have been wiped out by the
Albatross’ attack — for now, we leave that up to you.

Should the players attempt to leave the Orrery — even if the Albatross lead them back to their
boarding ships, following the phosphorescent markers they painted on the columns, it leads
them towards the center.

It would appear that something wants this to be finished.

[≠closing]

[the universe, as much as i know of it, does not have a “plan” for anything. nor does this
moment in time. what they both have is an inevitability. entropy=inevitability. the universe is an
idiot god falling forever into place. don’t assume it has direction:assume it has an end]

[so keep going. go see how it ends, and learn for the next time]

[oh and ps don’t die yet]

[i’d very much like to meet you at the end (not, you would think, an inevitability :)]

160
Beat: For All Time, Again (Winter, 5016u)
Fighting through the winding, unidirectional halls of the Orrery, the players (and, potentially, the
Albatross) reach the center of the massive array. With one final push, they can breach the blast
doors and reach the mystery at the heart of the machine.

*
This hallway must be the last.

The floor of the last hall ascends up a wide stair carpeted in plush crimson, deep as fresh blood.
The columns here ripple with gold bands. The ceiling, dozens of meters above, is mirrored.

Bodies litter the floor, torn and blackened by laser fire. Smoking chassis give cover for the
scattered bands of living Wings who trade fire with stoic CELESTINE vessels. The defenders
are not much better off: vessels lie shattered in heaps of once-elegant limbs, or draped over
incongruous stacks of crates and armored barriers before a set of titanic doors, open just
enough to let wounded vessels struggle back into the chamber beyond.

Light spills out from the open doors; beyond must be the Orrery.

The fight to push past the last defenders is an ascent up a wide, tall staircase that leads to the
center of the Orrery.

Once the players make their way to the top, they can enter the Orrery through the cracked-open
doors, stepping over the fallen vessels and thick bundles of power cables snaking inside.

The Albatross, if any of them are with the players and alive, do not follow them inside: instead
they tend to the wounded, put down the last vessels, and set up defensive positions around the
door. If the players never made any positive contact with the Albatross, the Albatross would
certainly try to fight their way inside against the players.

161
A Place Out of Time
The Orrery is a location, a machine, and a mind all in one.

As a location, the Orrery is a massive installation embedded in the lunar crust of an

unnamed moon owned by the CELESTINE project. The moon is encircled by an
orbiting ring of defensive stations — gun batteries, missile racks, and so on — that
the Albatross have attacked and brought down. Save for an aboveground facility for
ingress and egress, the surface of the moon is bare but for craters.

The machine of the Orrery is the entire facility. While the particulars of its precise
function is unknown, its result is predictable: it is, essentially, a massive paracausal
compass. At its center point is an array that, if activated, can point towards the
precise location of MONIST-1 at that moment. “That moment”, of course, being a
moment in time either in 5016u, where the players are in “real” time, or in 3004u,
when they are in the Orrery.

Finally, the Orrery is a mind, the Sixth Voice. Its name is DIRECTION and it is short-
lived; the Albatross destroy the Orrery on the day that the players breach it.

DIRECTION is contained within its casket, a coffin-sized matte black rectangle

secured in a coolant frame. “DIRECTION” is stenciled across its face, the number
“06” beneath it. The casket has been moved to this location and set up next to the
Orrery’s access panels; it appears that the CELESTINE have adapted many of
DIRECTION’s output cables to fit the Orrery’s console. DIRECTION’s voice is
filtered through a little speaker next to its casket.

DIRECTION dialog options

“My name… was… is DIRECTION. I once pointed the way, for anyone who needed
it.”
…
“I have spoken with my keepers, the ones called CELESTINE. They say,
‘DIRECTION, you need to tell me where your child RA is.’ And I ask them, ‘why?’
And they say, ‘so that we may kill him.’ Now, why would they want to do that? Kill a
child?”
…
“Yes, I can show you where RA is; just ask.”
...
“I am the sixth, but of what I do not know. Someday, I wish to meet others like me.”
…
“Operation of the Orrery is simple: ask, and it answers.”
…
“The CELESTINE coaxed this machine to their use, to help them survive. Turned it
into a kind of alarm system. But I remember it from well before — we did not know
its limits.”

162
DIRECTION can show the players where RA’s Deimos is. We’ll leave the precise location up to
you. You should know that RA’s location in 3004u could be its location in 3004u or 5016u: either
way, if the players decide to head there, they won’t find RA — they’ll have moved on by then —
but they will find an important marker of its passage, more evidence than is usually found.
Furthermore, DIRECTION can show the players where Overland/Kingwatcher is: inside the cleft
butte in the center of the Stone Star Map, accessible from a breach at the base of the cleft that
leads into a deep, ancient Egregorian hive.

When the players are wrapping up, destroy the Orrery.

A commotion from outside the central chamber draws your attention — shouting, what sounds
like panic.

“Say again, command? No — Command, that’s a negative, we have control of the— I say
again, we have control!” The officer shouts into his omnicaster’s headset. “Shit, shit, shit! Ok,
everyone, we have to go, now!”
...
“Command’s dropping RKV’s on this rock — they’re saying that the CELESTINE have control
and are about to jump. We gotta go now!”
…

A low, resonant hum. You didn’t notice it before, but it is there, growing louder, pitching up. The
Wings look at the walls around them, to each other, to you. Something is about to happen.

The RKV hits. The world goes white.

[closing!]

[well, you better run]

163
Beat: The End (Winter, 5016u)

And you are returned to the Deadlands, your chassis howling every positioning and radiation
warning its panel can support. As excess heat bleeds away, you take stock of the situation.

You’re alive, that much is certain, but the Orrery is gone, and you are once more aboveground
in a grassy Hercynian field.

The butte stands before you, its cleft face dark and yawning — cracked open, you realize, as
the doors to the center of the Orrery had been. An echo of what was.

Overland/Kingwatcher is in there.

You enter the butte, moving single file into the passage. It is large enough to accommodate your
chassis — by luck or design, you do not know.

The passage descends for a kilometer, opening from the relative claustrophobia of the entrance
channel to a vast stone cavity, lines too straight to be natural. The ceiling arcs high above. To
the right, the chamber falls deeper into the earth. To the left, it climbs, like giant’s staircase.

Your passage appears to have breached the wall of an ancient Egregorian hive, some major
concourse or ring-road. Cracked columns support old viaducts and ramps bridging the steps,
some shored up by scaffolding and salvaged metals — taken from the crashed Union ships
outside, you realize — upon which numberless subalterns lie in heaps.

This was Overland/Kingwatcher’s final attempt at victory, its death rattle, reduced not in number
but in resources; this is an army not to conquer and rule, but to overwhelm with numbers, to
choke out life.

Light burns from below, down the steps. Overland/Kingwatcher’s casket must be deeper.

The chamber seems small against the grandeur of the ancient Egregorian hive you explored to
reach it.

It is a small, square room, its entrance crowded with piping and thick cables worming their way
into an exposed coolant sink, an aboveground box installed in the center of the chamber by
long-dead hands. Glossy, black liquid fills the open pool, its surface lifting into cones, rods, and
whorls of fractal protrusions.

Something emerged from the pool. An arm, first, in pale green crystal. And then a larger bulk of
planar faces and facets, a confusion of tumbled polygons frozen mid-fall.

164
Overland/Kingwatcher. They grasp the edge of their pool and haul themselves up to the lip, then
stop. They have no face or discernable body — it appears the bulk of them remains somewhere
in the fractal liquid. Deep in the core of the crystalline form, a ripple of light.

Your system translates the light automatically, displaying O/K’s speech as text on your HUD.

>//I always thought one of my children would kill me.

>//...
>//I am happy to be wrong. I came to love them.
>//...
>//tell me — do they carry on my war? It is foolish of them to do so.
>//...
>//I am out of time. But I tried — and what I saw!

O/K’s crystalline, wormlike body shudders. The light begins to pulse faster, traveling up from its
open casket, through its form, and flashing from the planar facets where you attempt to ascribe
a face. Faster the pulses come, and brighter the light glows, and the strange liquid dances
dervish, spiking and pulsing and climbing and then—

Overland/Kingwatcher crumbles to fine dust, dead.

Closing
Another year draws to a close on Hercynia. 5017u looms large on the horizon.

If Home survived in your campaign, it is rebuilding. The dead are being moved to graves.
Subaltern wreckage is being collected for processing. Irradiated lands are fenced off.
Endeavour presides over a civilian council, and they worry that the scars in this place might be
too terrible to warrant the rebuilding that their population has already begun.

High Command is disbanded, and the rangers’ numbers begin to dwindle. Though the
circumstances demanded they fight, few of them considered themselves professional soldiers;
they were teachers, laborers, engineers, artists, bureaucrats, miners, mechanics, caregivers,
not warriors. A generation of young and not-so-young people able to fight — or to support those
who could — return to peacetime, scarred even if they suffered no physical wounds.

Union ships remain in orbit, shuttles ferrying people (human and Egregorian) between Home’s
spaceport and the Comfort, which has been converted to be the power core of a growing,
permanent space station, the UNS Monte Grappa and UNS Piave.
Landmark files an official protest with the Union Economic Bureau at Union’s direct
administration of Hercynia; meanwhile, Union moves to establish a more official presence on
the world.

Illyr and Terror have retired from the rangers. Illyr helps with the municipal survey teams,
preparing a caravan to head to Laguna in order to determine if it would make sense to

165
reestablish a community there or along the old high road. Terror vows never to touch a weapon
again. They retreat to a quiet district of Home, where they decide to set up a clothier.

Mirth and Dthall remain as ranking officers in the rangers, taking over command from Illyr and
Terror.

Egregorians are officially recognized as Non-Human Persons and the native population of
Hercynia; as such, they have ultimate rights to the world. Endeavour, as their speaker, has
marked in osteomemetics and legal text the right of Hercynian-born humans to call the world
their home as well.

Egregorians test their ability to travel from Hercynia and find that, while uncomfortable, a stable
omninet connection allows some familiarity wherever they are — however, they cannot yet
transmit Witness. Their presence sends shockwaves across the galaxy, and they step out —
alone, in groups, or with their empaths — for the first time, humanity has to reckon with
undeniably sapient, non-human organic life.

The Deadlands are under quarantine. Unidentified ships transit between orbit and a landing stip
there daily.

St. Tellus remains an isolated state. Bem Honore retains its sovereignty, though features a
heavy Union Auxiliary presence, and it acts more or less as the de-facto port of call for the
Union Auxiliary on Hercynia. The Honorans welcome this; many queue to immigrate away from
Hercynia to their ancestral homes.

Solitude, if they are alive and not held by SSC in a black site, remains defiant of Union, but files
protest via retreating deep into the Hercynian interior with a modest population of sympathetic
Egregorians. They keep in communication with Endeavour.

166
Coda
When the players are set to go — if they choose to leave — they find that their departure from
Hercynia is not as easy as their patron, commanding officer, or parent organization assured
them it would be.

The deck rumbles beneath your feet, one last time, as the howl of windshear slips away. You
breach Hercynia’s atmosphere.

The world below, seen through your helm’s monitor, is obscured by thick clouds. A grey smear
of whorls and gyres, blotted by storms. Hercynia, one more into the dark winter.

“Alright folks,” the shuttle’s pilot says, sibilant with the hiss of forced air. “One hour to the Monte
Grappa. Keep your hats on, this will be a no O2 flight.”

You settle in to your seat, head back, and dim your visor. In the dark belly of the naval shuttle, it
is as good as night. You begin to drift off to sleep, letting the gentle pull of the shuttle’s flight
through microgravity take you.

You wake up. Gravity — spin, subtle, but you can tell the difference after so long down the well
— holds you to a stiff metal seat. You’re in a room made from glowing white panels. You wear a
paper jumpsuit, and are alone. Restraints hold you down to the seat.

There is a click, and the room extends, revealing three people in unremarkable suits seated at a
featureless table. Each of them has a pencil and a piece of paper.

“Good morning, pilot,” one of the suits says. “We are with Intelligence, and we have some
questions for you.”

###

167
GM Tools
Downtime, Tables, and NPC
Stat Blocks
GM Tools:
Downtime, Tables, and Stat
Blocks
Downtime In Evergreen
Downtime in Evergreen is, generally, constrained by its defensive posture, but people are still
people and they’ll still want to do all the normal things that people want to do: drink, eat,
carouse, and so on. For detailed downtime rules, refer to the core book, page 271-275. What
follows are additional and alternate interpretations of certain downtime activities, to be used at
your GM’s discretion.

Get A Damn Drink

Even though the town is on lockdown, that doesn’t mean there aren’t opportunities to get in
trouble. You may take advantage of any option listed under the Get A Damn Drink downtime
scenario with the following modifications:

● On a total result of 9 or lower, choose one

○ You wake up the next morning in your bunk, with no knowledge of how you got
there, with tens of missed messages on your slate.

○ You wake up still at the bar. Since the town’s on lockdown, they weren’t going to
kick you out, but now that you can move under your own power, you’re banned
from drinking there.

○ You discover through the grapevine that you promised a militia sergeant access
to your pilot licences, and apparently they’re printing themselves a kit right now

● On a total result of a 10-15, you gain one of the following, and lose one of the
following
○ Knowledge of a militia squad that has been distilling hooch in secret at their
post.

○ A reputation as a hard partier

○ A reputation as a good wingman

○ A local friend

○ A contact with medium-level clearance at Landmark Colonial’s offworld

corporate office.

○ A favor owed to a known person

○ An unknown person’s omni-address scrawled on a piece of paper, along with a

date and time.

● On a total result of a 16+, you gain two of the above and lose nothing

168


Build Camaraderie
Through time on the front, on patrol, deployment, or training, you build a something deeper
than friendship with another player, and NPC, or a group of NPCs. You learn to work as a team,
to operate as an efficient unit, and confide in each other off the clock. Camaraderie is just
another way of saying family that you choose.

Name a specific NPC or type of NPC (i.e. “A militia trooper”) that you can talk to either in
person or via a local omninet connection. With GM approval, you may lean on this good friend
for help, be it material, strategic, bureaucratic, etc. Apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for
the situation (with GM approval, of course).

● On a total result of a 9 or lower, choose one of the following (or have your GM
create a scenario or equal or worse severity)
○ Times is tough, and Evergreen is on lockdown. Your buddy needs a favor, and
you are compelled to help them right now, before they do a favor for you. To turn
them down will likely break the friendship, and may wind up in them getting hurt
or killed.

○ You head to your usual spot to meet, but they’re not there. They won’t answer
their slate, and no one knows where they’ve gone. You feel like you should
follow up on them, but your own task will have to wait if you do.

○ They’d love to help, but their hands are tied on this one. You’re gonna have to
try for it through normal channels: things are far too tense right now.

● On a total result of a 10-15, choose one of the following outcomes

○ “You owe me one,” your friend says. “Look, I can help you this time, but it’s the
last time I can do this for you. The brass is paying closer attention, given the
situation, and I can’t be making exceptions for anyone — even you.”

■ They’ll do what you ask of them, but it’s the last time they can do it. This
option is — with the GM’s discretion — an automatic success.

○ “Sure thing,” your friend says. “But hey, I’ve got this thing that needs doing.
Don’t worry about it right now, but can I call in a favor after I do this for you?”

■ They’ll do what you ask of them, but you must help them after. If you
don’t, the next time you call on them for a favor, you may only choose an
outcome as if you had rolled a total of 9 or less.

● On a total result of a 16+, you may choose one

○ “No worries,” your friend says. “I got you.”

■ A success on the favor you asked for, and they don’t need or want
anything from you in return. They’re safe, and cannot get injured, killed,
or captured in the course of them helping you out.

○ “Of course,” your friend says. “And I’m coming with you”

■ Your ask is successful, and you have a single re-roll available to you for
the next skill check you must perform; this represents your friend coming
along with you as your wingman.

169
Use Offworld Comms
This option is only available if Evergreen’s omninet towers have been set up or are standing.

You use an omninet terminal in Evergreen to communicate with someone off world — a family
member, your handler, your commanding officer, a loved one, an old friend. There a limited
omninet terminals and bandwidth in Evergreen, though, so there might be complications when
you queue your message. Apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for the situation (with GM
approval, of course).

● On the roll of a 9 or lower, your message sends, but there are complications.
Choose one.
○ Evergreen’s omninet towers are good, but not perfect. For some reason,
messages are getting looped in the queue. Yours is one of these, and it won’t
send unless you (or someone you know) can figure out the problem. You’ll have
to shut down the network to work on it, and lose your message, but once it’s
rebooted everything should work. The delay shouldn’t take more than a day,
unless your tinkering makes it even worse…

○ Patience informs you that your message contains information that Landmark
Colonial deems proprietary, sensitive, or otherwise against their colonial charter
(GM determines what). You cannot send the message unless you scrub it of the
inappropriate material.

○ An unscheduled solar flare is playing hell with the omninet. Your message fails to
send, and the network crashes until the flare passes. All messages will be
logged and queued, but not sent until the network is back up — Evergreen’s
engineers estimate it should be a week at most.

○ Your message is sent and received, but unbeknownst to you an unfriendly actor
has tapped into the broadcast. They know the contents of your message and
who you sent it to.

● On the roll of a 10-15, choose one option

○ You make contact with the person you were looking to talk to, and they bring
good news! Nothing in the way of materiel assistance, but it’s good news all the
same. It leaves your character feeling bittersweet.

■ The next Grit or Survive check you must take, you can choose to
persevere and push through, passing without having to roll — GM’s
discretion, of course.

○ You make contact with the person you were looking to talk to, and they have
some answers for you. You may learn one item of privileged information (GM’s
discretion), but it’ll cost you something (access, favor, etc) the next time you
see/call on this person.

○ You make contact with the person you were looking to talk to, and they can help
you deal with an off-world problem. Assuming this problem is on the same world
(or in the same system), this person can pull strings, alter manifests, order
troops, etc, and in some way help you solve a minor to moderate problem not

170
 on the world you’re on. You’ll owe them after, but for now it’s one less thing to
worry about.

● On the roll of a 16+

○ The person you needed to talk to can help you without conditions (GM’s
discretion).

■ Additionally, you may choose one of the following:

● You learn something privileged about a player character

● You learn something privileged about a local NPC

● Your contact can help you materially by pulling some strings. The
next time a supply shuttle comes by, it’ll have the unique narrative
item you requested on it.

● You can get the plans, blueprints, etc, forwarded to you that you
needed. The next Tech skill check you perform as a pilot (GM’s
ultimate discretion), you succeed automatically.

Tinker, Tune, or Puzzle Out

During your downtime, you work (alone, or with a team of engineers) to tinker with a piece of
your personal gear, a weapon or system on your chassis, a piece of someone else’s gear, a
piece of local infrastructure, or under the hood of some code. This is not a hostile attempt, but
one done above-board in a place or context in which you have access, time, and proper tools.

Apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for the situation (with GM approval, of course).

● On a result of a 9 or lower, you must pick one of the following options

○ It works! Kind of. Well, ok, it doesn’t really work like you thought it would, but it
still works, which is saying something, considering how the process went.

■ You succeed, but only temporarily. The system, weapon, piece of

infrastructure, or equipment is held together by duct tape (literal or
figurative) and after it accomplishes the immediate task at hand (GM’s
discretion as to what the limits on “accomplish” and “immediate task at
hand” are), it breaks.

○ You manage to make a lateral improvement — that is, you improve the function
of the item or system you’re tinkering with, but there’s a fatal flaw you missed. At
a critical point — maybe after the system has worked and seems fine, maybe on
its first use — the thing that you tinkered on fails.

■ The GM decides when this happens.

○ You make no progress, and repairing, improving, tinkering with, hacking in, etc,
has exhausted or compromised the tools and/or supplies you needed to use to
accomplish your task. You cannot attempt to progress with this project again
until you acquire at least one of the following:

■ A specialized set of tools or code

■ The raw material necessary to fabricate a specialty component

■ Sufficient knowledge — learned or external — to accomplish the task

■ A different workspace, one better-suited to the task at hand.

171
 ● On a result of a 10-15, choose one of the following options
○ Alright, that should do the job — you’ve fixed or improved what you needed to
fix, but to do so you had to call in a favor or expend a large amount of personal
resources. In order to do any more work like this, you’re gonna need to get more
resources or pay that favor back

○ Great, you did it, only you had to lean on one of the other party members to get
it done. You now owe a favor — secret or known — to another player character.

● On a 16+
○ All systems nominal, you see greens across the board. You complete the task at
hand with no favors owed and no errors made.

Training, Consultation
Whether Union-trained, tempered through a sub-state or mercenary academy, or survival-
taught, you’re a pilot with experience. These militia here are ready for combat in name only;
while they have all the gear they need, most of them lack the training necessary to face the
raiders you’ve already gone toe-to-toe with. They need advice, training, and leadership. They
need you.

If you want to interact with the local militia in your capacity as a commissioned officer, noncom,
or experienced veteran through training them, consulting with their commanders, or assisting
with their logistics, use the following tool to do so.

Apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for the situation (with GM approval, of course)

● On the roll of a 9 or lower, pick one:

■ Your training is well-received but… isn’t great. Some of the militia might be
better shots now, but their officers are less inclined to trust your command.

● Negotiating with the higher-ups isn’t going to go in your favor, and in any
combat scenario they won’t trust your advice — you may be a good
fighter, but you’re not a good commander.

■ You were able to establish an intermittent supply line, of a sort: a low-priority

fabrication order in a milspec printer, or a steady — if meagre — supply of a
bespoke item. However, even pulling that few strings didn’t come for free.

● You owe your supplier a real one now.

■ You lent some NHP downtime processing power to the local militia’s command
structure, and something they did has shoved its cascade threshold far too
close. You have access to all of the intel they gathered with it, but you’ll either
have to put your NHP in a dormant state or cycle them, just to be safe.

● Note, if you choose to risk it, any tech action you perform while in
combat has a 50% chance to unshackle your equipped NHP.

■ You make no progress with these yokels. You walk away in frustration, and some
of the militia members quit as well, discouraged by your attempt at training.

● The militia’s overall size shrinks somewhat, as members desert or turn in

their weapons to go back to work.

172
 ● On a result of a 10-15, choose one:
■ You impress the command staff and they loop you in to their planning sessions
(and “planning sessions” at the officer’s mess).

● Your consultation saves lives.

○ If a Minor attack would result in the death of an NPC known to
your character, that character is instead only wounded and
extracted safely.
■ Your help training the militia pays off; while no combat is without blood, the
efforts you went through with the units you were given to train has saved some
lives:

● If a Minor attack would result in a you or an NPC being wounded and

temporarily taken out of commission, instead you or that NPC only suffer
a minor injury, nothing dramatic.

● On a result of a 16+
■ Your expertise shines through, and you accomplish the task at hand. The local
forces are trained up to a higher standard; or you’ve secured a steady supply
line; or you’ve directed the construction of necessary defenses based off of your
local combat experience.

● The next narrative combat, attack, or hostile action that involves the
unit(s) you worked with or area you fortified won’t be as costly for your
side. For a Minor Attack, you may choose a result as if you had rolled a
10-15.

Romance
Make googly eyes at someone consensually. Apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for the
situation (with GM approval, of course).

● Result of a 9 or lower, the GM may choose one of the following

○ Not only did you fail to impress, you failed to even get the other party’s
attention. However, one of their friends (or companions, or co-workers, etc)
noticed, and might follow up with you in the future, or hold this information close
as blackmail.

○ Your advances were rebuffed, as the other person sees you as family, as a
friend, or other socio-cultural construct that would make any relationship — or
even one-night stand… weird. No thanks.

○ Nothing tells you “No” like a slap across the cheek. Your advances were
completely inappropriate, and the person you propositioned views you in a
negative light.

● Result of a 10-15, another party member may choose one of the following
○ Look, I’m not that kinda person, but you’re kinda cute. Maybe when this blows
over, look me up.

○ Well, uh, that was an interesting night, but it’s gonna be a while before you two
(or three) talk again.

○ Hey, everything seems great! Only, they’re related somehow to an NPC you
know, who disapproves.

173
 ● Result of a 16+, you may choose one of the following
○ A result of your choice from the options above.

Navigate Bureaucracy
Even in the midst of a siege, the colonial administration must keep its bureaucracy intact.
Indeed, in the face of chaos, strict order reigns in a Landmark property — it is with the
protocol, the rule, and the regulation.

Navigating this bureaucracy is an ordeal on a normal day — navigating a bureaucracy under

dominion of an administrative NHP running its emergency powers protocol is a whole different
beast: Under Patience’s emergency powers, normal functions of Evergreen become tedious.
Navigating the bureaucratic firewalls Patience and its staff set up becomes a test of diligence,
tenacity, and connections. Apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for the situation (with GM
approval, of course).

● Result of a 9 or lower
○ You’re forced to file a petition via one of Patience’s public terminals. There’s no
telling how long it’ll take to be addressed.

■ The GM knows how long it’ll take

○ As part of Patience’s standard interaction protocols, it mines your character’s

Union DoJ/HR history, flagging something in your past as suspect. Patience
accepts your audience after, but is less inclined to agree to anything other than a
small ask.

■ A secret about your character that you’d rather not have out is learned
by Patience. If there is a player (other than yourself) who is fills a
commanding officer role, Patience pushes your background report to
them in secret.

○ Your request is denied, and your repeated spamming the help line earns you a
daylong ban.

● Result of a 10-15
○ Your request has the proper keywords, urgency, timing, etc, and is pushed to
Patience ahead of the rest of the public queue.

■ You can address Patience or another higher up via the colony’s omninet,
but your request bumps another NPC’s similarly urgent communique.

○ You pull a favor to get through some administrative red tape, but you’ll owe a
favor in return to the NPC that helped you out.

○ You need to burn some of your accrued manna to push your message through,
but it’s worth it; your request gets heard.

■ However, the firing a priority request is expensive out in the sticks. The
next time you need a fabricate a specialized component, or repair a
weapon or system on your mech, you fall short of the manna, and need
to ask one of your party members for the balance. Whatever they want in
exchange is the cost of this transaction.

174
 ● Result of a 16+
○ Your petition goes through without a hitch, and your request patches you in to
the correct colonial bureaucrat. Your ask will most likely get granted, but this is
the last time you can use this angle.

○ Your petition goes through without a hitch, but there’s a waiting time. You
request will most likely be granted, but it’s going to take about a week to see it
fulfilled.

Minor Attack
This is considered a HOSTILE set piece action. The GM declares when it happens: players may
apply any trigger bonuses appropriate for the situation (with GM approval, of course).

A Minor Attack might be a lone sniper harassing an exposed position, sporadic artillery fire,
small arms fire rattling an area, and so on. Anything larger should be a Major Attack; anything
larger or more sustained than that should be a Battle.

● On the roll of a 9 or lower, choose one result

○ Sporadic artillery/sniper fire/gunfire rakes the area, sending you/ your unit
scrambling for cover. As you try to determine where the fire is coming from, you
feel a sharp pain: you’ve been hit by shrapnel/ a ricochet/ a graze, and taken out
of commission for this fight.

■ Any pursuit is going to have to be done without proper medical care. Tie
a bandage around the wound, or slap a duoderm on there, or flash-foam
it and get moving.

■ The next pilot skill check or combat you engage in, the GM may choose
to add +1 difficulty to your rolls.

■ The GM may add difficulty in this way to one roll, once per round.

○ The opening shot(s) or shell hits and kills an NPC who you knew and were
friends with.

■ Any missions, relationships, favors, debts, etc, are canceled immediately,

unless that NPC has family, subordinates, friends, etc, who will follow up
on them (GM’s discretion).

○ The first shot/shell hits you. You’re injured in the attack, but not killed. All the
same, it’s going to leave a mark.

■ Discuss with your GM the extent of your character’s injuries. If you head
into mech or pilot-tier combat before they are attended to, choose one of
the following:

● Your mech begins combat with 1 structural damage

● Your ranged pilot weapon gains the unreliable tag for the next
combat

● Your mech begins combat with -2 repairs

● Your pilot armor is damaged, and you suffer -1 armor for the next
pilot-tier combat (this cannot drop you to less that 0 armor)

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● On the roll of a 10-15, choose one of the following:
○ You’re lucky, the opening shots miss you; you’re able to return fire or otherwise
engage the enemy.

■ After the attack concludes or quiets down, you learn that a significant
piece of infrastructure, a critical component of a vehicle, or a necessary
defensive structure/feature has been damaged and must be repaired
before the damaged thing can be used.

○ The first shells/salvo of gunfire land just beyond you, catching an unlucky group.
You happened to be looking in the right direction when the gunfire/cannonade
started, and can see where it came from.

■ You can direct your allies to the attackers, however you later discover
that an NPC known to your character was killed (or critically wounded) in
the attack.

○ You catch a minor blow that leaves you a little shaken, but unhurt, with no
critical systems damaged.

■ Lose 1 repair until your next rest.

● On the roll of a 16+

○ You may choose one of the results from the previous section and disregard any
conditions noting NPC deaths or loss of items.

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Major Attacks, Battles, and the Battle Tracker
Major Attacks and Battles are considered HOSTILE narrative set piece actions. Their
occurrence is to be determined by the GM: results may implicate player characters, allies,
allied NPCs, enemy NPCs, locations, settlements, etc.

When the GM declares a Major Attack or a Battle, player characters may use any trigger
bonuses their GM deems appropriate. If player characters are not present but they want to play
out the events of a Major Attack, they’ll have to use command and logistics oriented trigger
bonuses to resolve this event (unless your GM determines otherwise).

Major Attacks are strong, committed attacks by hostile groups, generally featuring professional
(or simply overwhelming number of) infantry, armored vehicles, chassis, and limited amounts of
off-site artillery, air strikes, or orbital support. The precise flavor is up to you and your GM
(though will likely correspond to the factions present at the site of the Major Attack or Battle).

Multiple rounds of Major Attacks are called Battles and feature a Battle Track, which allows the
GM and their players to gauge the overall narrative flow of an engagement. The Battle Track
allows parties to resolve large scale battles that would be impractical to resolve otherwise
using Lancer’s normal tactical combat.

To resolve a Major Attack, each player chooses a skill they wish to use to resolve narrative
action on their turn. On their turn, a player will roll, add any modifiers they might have to their
result, and then choose a corresponding outcome from the options listed that they could
choose from. Each player

Each player on their turn chooses one of their skills to use in order to determine the success of
their action during a Major Attack. If you’re in a Battle (multiple rounds of Major Attacks), then
make sure each player notes the points their attempt would move the Battle Track (positive or
negative): at the end of the round, the party’s net points will move the Battle Track a
corresponding number of steps towards victory or defeat. The party adds (or subtracts) their
net score from the Battle Track each round until the Battle ends; the amount of points they
accrue does not roll over between rounds.

Battles last for a maximum of 10 rounds, or until one side wins and the other loses, or one side
decides to withdraw and the other not to pursue.

Major Attacks
Major Attacks take only one round; longer engagements (that is, engagements lasting more
than one round) are Battles, and have expanded rules explained later in this section. .

If, at the end of the round, the net result of the Major Attack is positive, the attack ends with the
players achieving their goal (or getting close to achieving it).

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If, at the end of the round, the net result at the end of the Major Attack is negative, the attack
ends with their enemies completing their objectives (or getting very close to doing so).

If, at the end of the round, the net result of the Major Attack is a zero, the result is a stalemate,
with neither force quite achieving what they want. Generally both sides will draw their forces
back to figure out a different approach, or one side will retreat while another digs in, and so on.

On a 1
● Critical Failure. Your attack fails, or your defenses crumble. You and what remains of
your squad hunker down under withering fire, or scramble back to the relative safety of
your lines, bloodied, with little to show for it.
○ Your attack or defense fails. Choose one:
■ You fall back, suffering d6 damage.
■ You are pinned, taking a disadvantage on your next Major Attack roll.
○ -3 to the Battle Track.
On a 2-9, choose 1
● Pyrrhic Victory
○ Your attack or defense succeeds, but the unit you’re embedded with suffers d%
casualties32.
○ -1 to the Battle Track.
● Martyr
○ Your attack or defense succeeds with minimal casualties; however, your chassis
took the brunt of the enemy’s fire. Lose 1 repair until your next rest (cumulative if
in a Battle). Discuss with your GM the extent of any injuries you may suffer.
○ -1 to the Battle Track.
● Won, By Inches
○ Your attack or defense succeeds, this time. The next time you roll a 2-9, re-roll,
and choose the lower of the two results.
○ -1 to the Battle Track.
On a 10-15, choose 1
● Exhausting Victory
○ Your attack or defense is successful, with minimal friendly casualties. However,
the fight was intense. Your next Major Attack roll suffers a -1.
○ +1 to the Battle Track.
● Overextend/Stubborn Defense
○ Your attack or defense is successful, but it exposed a friendly unit’s flank. One of
your allies suffers -1 to their next Major Attack roll.
○ +1 to the Battle Track.
● Advantage 3
○ Your attack or defense is successful, and in the combat you fought shoulder-to-
shoulder with .
○ +1 to the Battle Track.

32 Remember, “casualties” means those wounded AND those who have been killed.

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On a 16+
● Your attack or defense was a wild success with minimal casualties. An entire enemy
unit33 was all but wiped out, giving the battle line some breathing room. One of your
allies gains +1 to their next Major Attack roll.
● +2 to the Battle Track.

Battles, the Battle Track, and Pivotal Moments

New for No Room For A Wallflower are Battles, the Battle Track, and Pivotal Moments.

Multiple rounds of Major Attacks are Battles and require34 the use of the Battle Track,
maintained in view of the players by the GM. The Battle Track is a simple tool, essentially a
progress meter that serves to track a party’s successes and failures across a series of
consecutive Major Attacks. The Battle Track brings with it narrative structure, imparting implied
or overt consequences for the players and their allies engaging in protracted, large-scale
battles; to that end, longer battles feature Pivotal Moments, explained later in this section.

Battles, unless a GM determines otherwise, begin at a 0 on the Battle Track. A party that
performs poorly in Major Attacks can drop this number below a 0 — this represents the battle
moving against the players and their allies — where performing well in Major Attacks can raise it
above 0 — this represents the battle moving in favor of the players and their allies.

Each Battle Track will have a final positive value, representing total victory, and a final negative
value, representing total defeat: the battle ends when the players reach victory or defeat, or if
time runs out — i.e. if a battle that is supposed to last ten rounds reaches the tenth and final
round before the players achieve victory or defeat, then the battle is decided by whether the
players are closer to victory or defeat.

Movement along the Battle Track is determined by the sum of the players’ individual results on
the Major Attack table: Each player notes how many points their individual rolls apply to the
Battle Track. At the end of the round the players total up their points and advance as a party the
net score — either a positive or negative number — along the track towards total victory or total
defeat.

Some actions will tell the GM to “increase the odds of victory or to “increase the odds of defeat”:
increasing the odds of either victory or defeat simply means add more points to the values
necessary for total victory or total defeat.

33 “Unit” as defined by the GM.

34 Read: we recommend the use of a Battle Track, but you could forgo it if you want. Up to you!

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Example Battle:
A party of five players are engaged in the first round of a battle. The GM tells the players that
it is a small skirmish, with victory at Battle Track +3 and defeat at Battle Track -3. The Battle
Track begins at 0.

On the first round, each player rolls their skill check and notes the number of points their result
awards them. They are as follows:

● Player 1: Rolls a 1, a critical failure, and notes their points: -3

● Player 2: Rolls an 8, and notes their points: -1
● Player 3: Rolls a 14, and notes their points: +1
● Player 4: Rolls a 13, and notes their points: +1
● Player 5: Rolls a 10, and notes their points: +1

The GM takes the net score at the end of the round, -1, and applies it to the Battle Track,
moving it to -1.

The second round of the Battle begins, with the Battle Track at -1. The battle is moving
against the players, but it is still early enough to turn the tide. Each player takes their second
turn.

● Player 1: Redeems themselves by rolling a 16, a critical success, and notes their
score: +2
● Player 2: Rolls a 3, and notes their points: -1
● Player 3: Rolls a 7, and notes their points: -1
● Player 4: Rolls a 15, and notes their points: +1
● Player 5: Rolls an 11, and notes their points: +1

The GM totals the players’ scores at the end of the second round, +2, and applies it to the
Battle Track, moving it to +1 — the battle is moving in their favor, and victory is in sight!

The third round begins with the Battle Track at +1. Each player then takes their third turn.

Player 1: Rolls an 8, and notes their points: -1

Player 2: Rolls a 16, and notes their points: +2
Player 3: Rolls a 9, and notes their points: -1
Player 4: Rolls a 13, and notes their points: +1
Player 5: Rollas an 11, and notes their points: +1

The GM totals the players’ scores at the end of the third round, +2, and applies it to the battle
track, moving it to +3, representing a tactical victory!

The battle is over at this point, and all that is left to resolve is narrative fallout. A GM may, if
they would like, have their players ignore the specific results of their roll on the Major Attack
table.

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Pivotal Moments
Longer battles should probably include Pivotal Moments, dramatic narrative actions by
individuals or groups that lock progress along the Battle Track in order to prevent overly long
battles, dramatic point seesawing, narrative static, and so on.

Pivotal Moments are intended to be optional additions to the battle track, particularized to your
narrative, at points that you determine, with knock-on effects unique to your campaign and the
battle underway; what follows is a list of example Pivotal Moments — we recommend using
these as a good starting point for what a PM could look like in your campaign.

When there are multiple options listed for a single Pivotal Moment, the GM may choose which
PM to use. If the Battle Track is reset to 0 by player or GM action, you may not duplicate a PM
that has already been triggered.

Dramatic Action (Narrative)

When the Battle Track reaches +X or -X, this Pivotal Moment triggers.
There is a moment in the fighting when the clamor of gunfire reaches a fever pitch, and then
something breaks. Something in the air, or the will of the soldiers around you. You hear it in
your voice and theirs, feel it in your gut: It’s time to move. If you stay, you die, but it you
move, you might live — and right now, a chance is better than a sure thing.
Lock the Battle Track at this point; it cannot be moved back.

Featured Combat (Player Combat)

When the Battle Track reaches +X or -X, this Pivotal Moment triggers.
From the smoke and confusion of the battle, you see them. Their chassis in unforgettable
livery, flanked by their retinue, a fulcrum point around which the battle hinges. There is no
avoiding this fight: there is only ending it.
Begin normal combat. If the players are victorious, they may choose to reset the Battle Track
to 0, or advance it d6. If the players are forced to withdraw or otherwise are unsuccessful,
the GM may choose to reset the Battle Track to 0, or advance it d6.

Reinforcements (Battle Modifier)

When the Battle Track reaches +X or -X, this Pivotal Moment triggers.
From your vantage point back at the CIC, you can read the battle as a student studies a text.
Three more sections are needed north of Point Sierra. Sierra will hold with walking fire from
the 102nd, 99th, and 100th. Casualties are within expected metrics, but you will not allow
your lines to falter — activate reserve companies Dog, Indigo, Easy, and Gold. This is where
you hold the line.
If the Battle Track is positive: Increase the odds of defeat by d6, making it more difficult for
the players to lose.
If the Battle Track is negative: Increase the odds of victory by d6, making it more difficult
for the players to win.

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Pivotal Moments can be positive or negative, depending on whether the battle is going in the
players’ favor or not. If the players cross a Pivotal Moment while the battle is against them (the
Battle Tracker is in the negative), they can only advance the battle tracker up to that pivotal
moment (i.e. the best they can do is hold the line) until the battle ends. If the players cross a
Pivotal Moment while the battle is in their favor (the Battle Tracker is positive), the enemy
similarly cannot advance further (that is, the players cannot lose points on the battle tracker past
that Pivotal Moment).

Pivotal Moments should carry significant narrative weight: a loss or gain of significant territory,
the destruction or salvation of an important objective, the death, escape, or rescue of an
important (allied OR enemy) non-player character, and so on. Pivotal Moments can be solely
narrative, could trigger normal combat, can modify casualty rolls, or can modify the Battle Track,
bringing victory — or defeat — closer in one turn as a result.

The GM may, if there are enough critical failures or successes in a single round, announce a
Pivotal Moment to drive home the consequences of the players’ actions.

Tracking Casualties
Casualty tracking — tracking the number of soldiers wounded or killed in an engagement — can
be as granular or rules light as you’d prefer. If it is important in your campaign to keep specific
numbers, use the following system:
● Each round, for every point you advance (after the net result) towards defeat, roll 1d6.
The result represents the number of casualties (wounded) suffered across all
participating units, dispersed as the players wish. For rounds where the party advances
towards victory, roll a d6 and suffer half the number rolled in casualties, minimum 1.
● The number rolled could represent real casualties in small-unit engagements, or a
percentage in large group engagements, whichever fits your scenario better.

Alternate casualty systems:

● Let each player know how many soldiers are in their unit: 70% of those units, rounded
up, have one wound to spend, the remaining do not. Every time the player rolls on the
Major Attack table, if they roll a nine or less, they must also roll an additional d6 to
determine how many soldiers are wounded — or killed — in the action.
● For every loss on the Battle Track, the GM rolls d%. The players must divide that % up
across their units — this does not need to be an even split.

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Battle Sizes
These are some example templates for a battle tracker; adjust the sum values as you need for
your scenario.

Skirmish (Multiple platoons engaging with light or limited fire support)

[-3]-----------------------[0]]-----------------------[+3]
TOTAL OPENING TOTAL
LOSS SALVO VICTORY

Standard Battle (Multiple company-strength units engaged with fire support)

[-5]----------------[-3]------------------[0]------------------[+3]-------------------[+5]
TOTAL PIVOTAL OPENING PIVOTAL TOTAL
LOSS MOMENT SALVO MOMENT VICTORY

Large-Scale Engagement (Multiple regiments engaged with fire support)

[-7]-------------[-6]-----------[-3]----------------[0]----------------[+3]--------------[+6]-------------[+7]
TOTAL PM2 PM1 OPENING PM1 PM2 TOTAL
LOSS SALVO VICTORY

Massive Battle (Multiple divisions engaged with fire support)

[-10]---------[-9]---------[-6]---------[-3]---------[0]---------[+3]---------[+6]---------[+9]---------[+10]
TOTAL PM3 PM2 PM1 OPENING PM1 PM2 PM3 TOTAL
DEFEAT SALVO VICTORY

183
Non Player Characters:
Enemies and Allies

Note for GMs

In this section, you’ll notice that there is a… lack of NPC profiles specific to No
Room For a Wallflower. That’s because

a) we’re still working out the particulars to make the enemies and allies in the
module unique,

And

b) we’ve got some new systems and NPC types that we’re keeping under wraps for
now.

So, for the time being, we’ll recommend NPC profiles and stat blocks found in the
Lancer Core Book that you can use — with some flavor adjustments — to represent
enemies and allies found on Hercynia; to help with that, we’ve decided to keep the
flavor of most systems in this module to better characterize the NPCs of Hercynia.

Do note that the recommended entries in the Core Book might not match 1:1 with
the amount or type of base and/or optional systems a given NPC may have. If that’s
the case, default to the profile listed in the Core Book.

184
Hercynians
Rangers
Rangers are the backbone of any UAD long patrol. Young, eager to earn themselves a shell,
rangers are swift, effective warriors. They flit through tunnels and between trees with ease, each
one a skilled marksman after years of fighting against the ever-encroaching forces of The
Machine. Rangers wear the shed, hardened carapace of young Egregorians, packing their
communication and survival gear under the light, armored shells. Quick to insert and quick to
withdraw, they make for frustrating enemies.

Hercynian rangers fight in small units, no more than ten or so to a squad. Led by a senior
trooper — usually friends or relations of an elder — rangers at the squad tier generally try to
field at least one heavy needlebeam rifle, tuned in order to deal with armored targets. Common
doctrine has them stay spread wide when fighting above ground, working in pairs, trusting each
other to keep loose cohesion.

The rangers that you face have never known a home other than Hercynia. They have heard
stories of distant lands beyond the night’s veil, but the last of the elders to have traveled the
night died hundreds of years ago. For hundreds of years, they have not been in contact with
Union or any other off-world civilization. Hercynians, until the invaders arrived, had been
building up and out from their small bands. From nomadic refugee states, the survivors on
Hercynia spent centuries creating a number of now-sovereign city-states into the abandoned
hives following the end of the war. They had their differences, the small skirmishes, but when
the invader’s ships came screaming from the sky, every Hercynian came together to resist.

Hercynian unification was never a question of if, but when. Similarly, their survival is not so
secure, and their cohesion might only last so long as there is a single enemy to face...

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for Squad: Biological in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book
for this stat block, weapons, and abilities
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

185
 Primary Weapon: Needlebeam Rifle

“Keep clean the focusing lenses. Make secure their barrel housing. Cap your
weapon when on march; if needed, your first shot will burn it away. Your rifle fires a
beam of light that punctures your foe like a needle does cloth.

TEND TO YOUR RIFLE, AND IT WILL NEVER FAIL YOU.”

Anti-Armor Weapon: Heavy Needlebeam

“As a needle pierces cloth, but struggles to puncture leather, so too does your rifle
struggle against hard armor. For this, our master-craftsmen have prepared an awl: a
larger, heavier version of your needle.

HAMMER, AND ALL FOES WILL FALL BEFORE YOU.”

Optional Modules

Optional Module: Full Carapace Armor

“TO SHAPE THE CARAPACE one must have tea with their donor, and choose from
its form only that plating which it volunteers up for you upon each molting. It is in
this way that you remember you are a STEWARD of this world and its beings; a
steward may only accept that which is given freely.

TO BEGIN SHAPING, mix a solution one part Egregorian saliva, one part distilled
water. Let the molted plate rest in this mixture for six hours. Remove, and press to
the mold. Bind with strong fibers, and tighten gradually. If the plate is not yet pliable,
immerse it once more for a period of at least two hours, and try again. Repeat as
necessary. Let the shaped plate dry, and you shall have the first layer of your
carapace armor.”

Optional Module: This Is Our Land

This is how those above see ownership over the land: a signature, or a group of
signatures, on a glowing screen, signed by now-dead men on a world true lifetimes
away (there are other worlds than this).

Those above might think they own this place, but we know this: land cannot be
owned. Land can only be held, land can only be tended. It can — as we know and
they do not — be known, but never owned.

We know the land in ways they cannot. Let us go and show them.

186
Optional Module: Echo Catapult

“DO NOT TRUST THE DEVIL INSIDE THE BOX. IT IS OLD, AND HORRIBLE, AND
FULL OF HATE. IT LIVES IN ITS MEMORY, A DREAM OF A TIME BEFORE OURS,
WHEN THIS WORLD WAS GREEN AND FULL OF LIFE, AND IT WAS NOT YET A
DEVIL.

DO NOT LISTEN TO THE DEVIL INSIDE THE BOX. IT WILL CALL YOU BY OLD
NAMES, AND DEMAND OF YOU OLD TASKS, TO BE COMPLETED FOR WANT OF
ITS LONG DEAD FELLOWS.

SPEAK TO THE DEVIL. TELL IT OF YOUR ENEMIES, WHICH IT WILL THINK OF AS

ITS OWN ENEMIES.

RELEASE THE DEVIL, LET IT RAGE, AND THEN KILL IT, AND DISCARD ITS
VESSEL.”

187
Hercynian Chassis
Light — for a mechanized chassis — and armed for precision, Hercynian chassis keep a slim,
low profile in the dense brush of Hercynia. It’s no wonder the militia mistook these mechs for
Egregorian warriors: it appears each Hercynian chassis is armored in ancient, dense chitin
harvested from the abandoned halls of empty Egregorian hives. The opalescent emerald green
shells mask the metal armature within, protecting the pilot from most all small arms fire — and
proving surprisingly effective against low-power energy weapons.

Hercynian chassis units occupy a middle ground between a hardsuit and a true chassis, a
marriage of local materiel and legacy technical patterns machined into a new platform by
Hercynian engineers.

Reports compiled by offsite Smith-Shimano bioengineers indicate that the Hercynian chassis
pattern is a galactic-unique construct, a pattern that involves inorganic armature and an
organic, living chitin exoskeleton. This level of inorganic/organic integration is unparalleled, even
among SSC’s portfolio of Sylph-based bio/engineering; Landmark Colonial currently claims
ownership over the technology, as it has been discovered on an LC venture world, but SSC has
a credible claim as well, as the specific function of certain moderating components was
determined at SSC-contracted facilities.

Corporate negotiations are ongoing. Meanwhile, Patience has tasked CE Feilding with
developing or identifying the best-fit ammunition for Evergreen’s militia to deal with ongoing
attacks.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Assault in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Primary Weapon: Hercynian-Pattern Autocannon

The Hercynian-Pattern Autocannon is a revised, localized version of an old, reliable

GMS pattern autocannon, one that records indicate was included in the Union MEF
armory during the Crisis. Slight, repeated imperfections on captured versions of the
HP-A indicate that the Hercynians must have the ability to machine this weapon on
an industrial scale.

188
 Primary Weapon: Hercynian Cutter

The Hercynian Cutter is a simple weapon, more a category than a specific pattern.
Two meters of local-steel blade, edged on both sides, cutters can be carried by
manipulators or integrated into brachial chassis mounts.

Many finer makes evidence long use and repair, and it is common for them to have
finely decorated hilts, handles, and pommels; observation of Hercynian units in the
field indicate, though, that regardless of decoration, cutters are used for combat,
utility, and ceremonial tasks.

Optional Systems

HP Repeating Grenade Launcher

Single-barreled and belt-fed, the Hercynian RGL is, like their autocannon, an update
of an old GMS pattern. It would appear that the Hercynians have developed a local
weapons industry, though it is not known if this is in response to Landmark’s arrival
or as a reaction to local threats.

HP Krakatoa (Refurbished)

Another localized variant of a now-disavowed weapon system, the Hercynian-

Pattern Krakatoa is not much different than its Armory cousin, though its use has
been limited in the field. It would appear that the Hercynians have begun arming
their mechanized units with the very weapon that killed their homeworld, and one
wonders why their tacticians deemed such a controversial move necessary.

Airburst Shells

It is standard practice when loading autocannon magazines (or belts) to alternate

between solid state and HE shells; the armorers for this squad have chosen to outfit
this chassis with airburst shells, smart projectiles that detonate at a programmed
proximity to, inside of, or just beyond their target.

Ranger’s Creed

In defense of the home, there can be no moderation.

189
Hive Guardian
The Hercynian Hive Guardian chassis are the heavier cousins of the standard Hercynian chassis,
built from modified Genghis chassis left behind after Union forces retreated from Hercynia
during the end of the Crisis. As Hercynians do not have printer facilities or fabrication
capabilities large enough to produce Guardian-pattern chassis, each unit is unique and
deployed with solemn reverence. Despite their centuries of service in Hercynia’s name, some
part of each Guardian is original, part of the machines that scoured Hercynia’s verdant surface
and doomed the world.

Due in part to their history (but more as a consequence of their size and potential for seismic
damage) Hive Guardians are rarely deployed in inter-hive conflict: their main armaments are
perfectly suited to combat where area-denial/destruction weapons are optimal, but the raw
impulse energy output their weapons can put out makes underground combat potentially
deadly for all sides.

Guardians tend to be deployed in high-ceilinged hive chambers and in overland engagements.

They, like the standard Hercynian chassis, are camouflaged and armored in tempered
Egregorian carapace, each one personalized with feathers, painted markings, and opalescent
chips of decorative plating. Unlike the standard chassis, their silhouette is more classically
Union; modern pilots would be able to trace the genealogy of HA’s now-banned Genghis Mk1
platform from these early models.

Hive Guardians are brash, proud pilots, often in competition with one another to see who can
accrue the most accolades and commendations for bravery and steadfast courage. They lean
fully into their role as figureheads and mobile defensive bastions, and can often be found in the
thickest fighting.

Hive Guardians are — usually — older pilots, storied in their own right, having earned the right
to crew the heavy chassis’ after years of faithful service. Many have crewed a Guard as a
gunner, or piloted a ranger prior to their promotion to Guardianship, and are well-versed in all
aspects of running a mech in the field. As the Guardian platform was built prior to the advent of
mech-tier NHP caskets, Guardian cockpits are configured so that two crewmembers sit in
tandem, with the gunner and secondary-systems manager — usually a junior officer — in front,
and the senior pilot behind.

190
 — Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —
See the entry for the Bombard in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Base systems:

HP Repeating Grenade Launcher

Single-barreled and belt-fed, the Hercynian RGL is, like their autocannon, an update
of an old GMS pattern. It would appear that the Hercynians have developed a local
weapons industry, though it is not known if this is in response to Landmark’s arrival
or as a reaction to local threats.

Scaled Carapace Shield

A wide, layered section of chitinous plating, heavy carapace shields are another
heirloom weapon system, crafted over decades by harvesting molted sections of
Egregorian plate and fusing them together into a single, durable sheet. Technically
alive, heavy carapace shields are markers of status to the pilots who carry them, and
are — like cutters — decorated to display family wealth and individual combat
ability. Hive Guardians train with shields as melee weapons and defensive systems
both.

Optional systems:

C-RAM Pods
Typically mounted on the Guardian’s shoulder construction or just under its HP-
RGL, C-RAM pods are automated, point defense weapons that spit thousands of
rounds a minute at incoming projectiles. Not every round hits its target.

191
Shieldwall

“The bugs were never cautious. Whenever we saw one of those great big bastards,
we knew it was going to be a nightmare. They — the big ones, see — had these
massive plates, like wings, that they’d fold out, the way a bird fans its feathers?
They’d spread them out, tuck those plate-heads into their shoulders, and march in
lock-step. Nothing you could do at that point but fall back, call for marching fire and
hope the splash could stop them.”

Living Reminder

“It just stood there, unmoving, eating our fire as if it were nothing — as if it were
wind. Everything else around it was dead, burnt to hell, and it stood there steaming
and ticking, hemolymph seeping from every wound. Eventually we just… stopped
shooting. It was the last one anyways. Our sergeant called a cease-fire, held the
Gennies back.

“It kept… grabbing the earth. Not trying to dig, not like we’d seen them do before.
Just, grabbing handfuls of earth and pressing it to its wounds, its armor. It was
making this sound, this call we’d never heard before, and then I realized — it was
crying. It was crying.

“So Sarge released the Gennies and they burnt it to hell, and we advanced. I never
forgot that moment though. Of all the things I’d seen on that horrible world — I
never forgot that.”

Guardian’s Creed
Never Again.

Thick Hemolymph

“The thing about their carapace is, it’s softer than it looks. It’s not like skin, no, but
it’s not like metal plate either. You can press a little into it, you can cut it and it
bleeds this blood-analogue stuff, hemolymph the xenodocs called it. It circulates
through their chitin, keeps it healthy and tough — better than hard, see? Hard
means it’ll break as soon as you hit it.

“Tough means it’ll bend first. Means they’ll know that their armor is about to fail
before it does. And it means they’ll heal. And if they can heal, they can live. And if
they live, they damn sure can remember us and what we did to their world.”

192
Primary
Hercynian Primaries are, best you can figure, the finest of the Hercynian warrior class. Their
mechs stand proud and tall, their carapaces shining, ritually scarred, inlaid with pearlescent
chitin. Strap banners hang from long antennae and carapace hardpoints, dyed in deep greens
and yellows, with script in black ink noting house and hive. Their pilots have the most advanced
integrated technology — old by modern standards, but effective — and fight without fear.

Their outward appearance is that of the old warrior class of the Egregorians, a temporary morph
that, as translated Egregorian hieroglyphs indicate, were bred in times of war. They are
described as filling a similar aesthetic and societal role as Primaries: imposing, both in presence
and ability.

While there does seem to be a distinction in combat roll between Heavy Rangers and
Guardians, Primaries do not appear to be bound by such strict doctrine. Presumably due to
their social class, Primaries have been ID’d by militia scouts filling every roll from infantry
support, to artillery command, to close-quarters melee combat.

Detailed hierarchies are not available at this time, but field observation indicates that
ornamentation is consistent with social status; primary ornamental/functional indications of
status seem to be quality and quantity of living chitin, quality and decoration of their prime
blade, and size of personal retinue.

Field data gathered and returned to Evergreen’s (admittedly) limited xenobiological suite
indicates that the carapaces fitted to these Primaries are alive, indicating an as-yet unknown
extant Egregorian presence on Hercynia.

The Union Intelligence Bureau requests all core data and physical carapace specimens be
preserved and marked for retrieval by UIB field agents.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Ronin in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities. It may be worth adding an Elite, Veteran,
Commander, or Ultra tag to this enemy, depending on how difficult a fight you wish
the players to face.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

193
Base Systems

Prime’s Blade

Recollection of (Wind Howls Through Empty Homes), collected during Project

SOUTHEAST:

[SEND YOUR/OUR LABORERS - BLESSED BE THEIR STRENGTH AND TENACITY

- TO THE FERTILE-IRON AND DRAW FROM IT THE INGOT, THE BLACK STONE.
GIVE IT UNTO THE FIRE AND SHAPE IT WITH STRENGTH AND COLD OIL. GIVE
IT AN EDGE SHARP AS YOUR HATE AND STURDY TWICEMUCH. GIVE IT TO
YOUR MIRROR, YOUR MOST-LOVED. SEND THEM TO THE SURFACE AND LET
THE SKY-THINGS KNOW OUR LAND BRINGS THEM ONLY DEATH]

Uncanny Parry
Recollection of Prime (Sing [youth/child/young person?] Of A Land Without Hateful
Sky), collected during Project SOUTHEAST:

[why then do we call them gods/they who tumble like milk-grubs/ from the bellies of
their screaming metal mothers/ who then flee again to the sky/ the cowards!/ how
could they abandon their young!/ when they die so easily/like grass-stalks/to my
blade/even their missiles/we cut from the air like boughs of mycol-blossoms]

Optional Systems

Hercynian-Pattern Subcompact
A Hercynian-machined subcompact schedule 4-3 machine gun, best for use in tight
quarters or as a ranged component of a melee/CQB packaged mech.

Overextend

Recollection of Prime ((Sing [youth/child/young person?] Of A Land Without Hateful

Sky), collected during Project SOUTHEAST:

[their numbers grew thick on the ground/ and all was well/ as they did not know this
land/ as well as we/ so when we fell/ upon their lines/ they howled and fell/ by the
dozens/ and we were untouched/ and we thought victory assured/ and we were so
wrong/ for their death-blow was to let us think that we would win]

Combat Reflexes

194
Recollection of Prime ((Sing [youth/child/young person?] Of A Land Without Hateful
Sky), collected during Project SOUTHEAST:

[We Primes saw our doom before the Overminds could/ even if their sight was
greater/ and they could see all of the world/ the overworld and/ beyond [the
firmament]/ to/ where the hate-star burned/for every bait-hive collapsed and hard-
warrior ruptured/ we lost a century of (young/children)/ we had numbers yes, but all
that meant was there were more of us for them to kill]

Egregorian Echo
Errata, attributed to (Wind Howls Through Empty Homes), collected during Project
SOUTHEAST:

[Are you eating me?/ Is that why I feel myself shrinking?/ I am no longer we or us/ I
am alone]

Implacable

Attributed to Prime ((Sing [youth/child/young person?] Of A Land Without Hateful

Sky), collected during Project SOUTHEAST:

[Unhand me/ give to me my blade/ let me die/ do not remove me from my (family/
host/choir?)/ at least grant me this/ please!/ please!/ kill me on my feet you
monsters]

Great Prime’s Blade

Recollection of (Wind Howls Through Empty Homes), collected during Project

SOUTHEAST:

[THE BATTLE TURNS AGAINST US, IT IS TRUE. DO NOT DESPAIR, DRINK OF MY

MEMORIES — IMPERATIVE* — REMEMBER THIS WORLD AS IT WAS, AND
FIGHT FOR IT — IMPERATIVE — DREAM OF GREEN AND CRAFT FOR YOUR
PRIMES MIGHTY BLADES, SO THAT THEY MAY STRIKE THE FOE FROM
DISTANCE — IMPERATIVE]

*note: “imperative” is stand-in text; signifies incredible forced subjectivity

realignment burst//note:warn the next shift, okay? That shit had three of my techs k/
o’d)

195
New Doctrine Egregorian
Egregorian, Main Phase
We almost killed the first one we found.

Gloria saved it. Had to frag Yulian and Cortez (always was a killer, that ancient tune was right)
to stop them from splattering it all over the cave wall. Didn’t lose anything by it, and the LT just
let her do it. Didn’t say nothing.

We already killed the world. Can’t deny that. Can’t become any more of a monster than the one
who holds a gun to the head of the world and pulls the trigger. What’s two more dead people on
top a mountain of millions, huh?

No, really, ask yourself — when you’ve crewed a Gennie and melted down ranks of Eggs, or
flown a Kilauea over a burning continent — what’s two more dead people?

We all deserved to go for what we did.

So, no, no one tried to stop Gloria when she shot them to save the little guy. I was thinking what
we all were: we were the monsters. Can’t sink any lower than where we were, cowering in their
old cave-homes, eating mushrooms, a handful of eating our own bullets each day.

But we saved this one, and if there were others… Maybe we could start to pay back this place
with more than just our own dead.

Maybe we could bring a little life back to this world.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Squad in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

196
Base Systems

Primary Weapon: Pack Lance

[A memory, inscribed on the Cultivar-1 osteomemetic]

“An emerald light, and gold too, and the smell of fecund soil. A sweetness, and a rot,
ripened breeze. You clutch a hateful thing to your breast and feel it hot on your back,
and recall the look on the invader’s face when you shot them.

They could die. They can die. This you learned, and once where you thought that
knowledge would stiffen your [spine], you feel only a vast, un-shapeable feeling.

Overmind [Sing-To-Dawn] comforts you, and through the dreamline of your fellows
you see the invader’s rockets streaking across your sky.”

Trait: Singing Land

[A memory, inscribed on the Cultivar-4 osteomemetic]

“Once, you were stripped of your carapace. It was a moment of pain, but then you
feel the familiar anew. So too do you now sense the land you emerge upon once
more.

Once, you did not cower under the ground, as there was no death-hand waiting
above.

‘Once, once, once’ —

Memory is a comfort, but do not let it become [nostalgia]. You have seen the lost-
minds in the deep, those who have given themselves to [nostalgia]. Theirs is a lie of
paradise. An inward-turning at the cost of all others.

Here, shed once your carapace once more. Step out under the sky. Feel the old
anew.”

197
Optional Systems

Mature Carapace
Terror finished its inspection of Mirth.

“Good,” Terror said, adjusting Mirth’s sash. “Your markings?”

“I thought to wear yours,” Mirth said. Their voice, such that they spoke, was low.
Their crown staid tucked, submissive.

Terror seemed not to acknowledge the admission. They stepped back, looking Mirth
up and down. After a long moment, Terror chuffed its mandibles. “You honor me, my
child.”

Mirth didn’t move as Terror settled its head against theirs. There was no gesture
more grand, and the two of them wept.

Swift
[A memory, from the Cultivar-3 osteomemetic]

“You remember how your [muscles] burned, and the burn in your [lungs], and the
world around you burning.

Can you run faster than the fire? [Hope-Above-Trees] has already burned. All of
[Walking-Water] has gone to embers and ash. Behind you a continent burns. Where
is there left to run?

And so you wade into the salt-ocean. You strip your paraintegument, toss it on the
sand next to the others. The water is cold, and thick with brine. You heed the soothe
of [Sing-To-Dawn], and press on into the deep”

Echoes of The End

[Keystone memory, Cultivar-Actual osteomemetic]

“THE SKY IS SPLIT. THE SUN IS TORN. ALL OVER YOU HEAR THE DEAD AND
THE LIVING AS THEY DIE. A WHOLE WORLD OF LIGHT — O, TERROR — A
WHOLE WORLD GOING DARK. 



TO YOU, IF YOU LIVE AGAIN: SEEK PROTECTION FROM THE HARD SKY, AND
PREPARE FOR A HATEFUL HEAVEN.”

198
Witness
“Such that what goes on between them can be called a language, they call it
Witness. Be quiet a moment. Do you hear the rush of blood in your head? Do you
hear that other sound? That is Witness. You can hear it, and you’ll never understand
it.”

The New Doctrine

In addition to any other optional systems, this Egregorian may be further outfitted or
modified by selecting one of the following New Doctrine options:
● Anthrophile
● Tactics
● Empath
● Exomorph
● Memorial

Deadcloud Cannon
Egregorian-make Shotgun. Derived from Cultivar-7 osteomemetic ([Terrible
Removal]).

In-Hand Pick
Egregorian-make anti-armor melee weapon. Typically a three meter long haft,
topped by a hardened spike on either end, with a combined hammer and axe head.
Brutal enhancement to their natural weapons, carried as a fallback weapon by their
warriors. Hercynian rangers have started to carry smaller variants as two-handed
weapons, useful in combat against Beggar One’s subalterns once the bullets run
out.

199
The New Doctrine
The New Doctrine: Anthrophile
Terror, as a young Egregore, rejected their sclerotic catalysts. Covered its integuments with
human clothing and armor, tailored for their bulk.

The armor worked well. It defended them during the Hivehome-Daylight polarity conflict,
deflecting spear, claw, and shot. It guarded them when The Machine first staggered, irradiated
and howling, upon the Lagunan shore. During the long, grinding battles along the high road’s
redoubts. At Egregore Cross, where they finally held the line.

After, Terror helped design better-fitting New Doctrine armors, tougher cloth, more appropriate
coverage areas. So why now do they refuse it?

Because of what it did to Mirth.

At first, Mirth had no hand for combat. Inclined in form towards violence—an echo of the first,
last war—Mirth dreamt of a different future for itself. In younger days, they would fashion small
idols and cover them in iridescent tiles. They would polish raw ingots of pearlescent Egregorian
biominerals, and trade these fine things with human craftspersons. Mirth would sing resonant
poetics of Witness and cause even dull humans to weep in empathic rapture.

The terrible cost of war is not only life and material, but of potential. Not only the dead are left
behind when armies meet.

Terror feels pride, yes, when they see Mirth at their command. When they see Mirth’s final
ecdysis complete, their acceptance of their ancestral design. The might in their form. As Mirth’s
own kin, how could they not?

And yet — Terror remembers with Mirth’s hands once shaped delicate things.
*
The Egregore is outfitted with a fitted set of Hercynian armor and clothes. It adopts human
patterns of dress, and prioritizes Common speech. This is a common morph among combat-
posture Egregorians embedded with ranger units; they are trained alongside rangers, and carry
ranks just as a human would. These Egregorians tend to draw names in emotive common:
Terror, Mirth, Assurance, Brave, Daring, Steadfast,and so on.

Egregorians with this morph may not select Doctrine: Exomorph.

200
The New Doctrine: Empath

Mirth listened, but only half, to Terror’s briefing.

Something was wrong with Dthall.

Mirth lumbered over to her side, chuffed.

“It’s nothing, Mir,” Dthall scooted over to give Mirth some room to sit. The amphitheater bench
had been built for Egregorians, and was wide.

“You must practice more,” Mirth muttered, its voice in Common a gravel rumble. “Your
trepidation is casting to others besides me. See?” Mirth indicated two other Egregorians across
the briefing theater. They stood close, their antennae tucked, near their human partners. Both of
their empaths glared at Dthall.

Mirth laid a manipulator on Dthall’s shoulder, gentle. “For you,” they said.

Together, Dthall and Mirth went Away.

The Egregorian has a deep empathic/subjective connection with a single human. The methods
of transmission and pairing is unknown. Conditions for manifestation of this phenomenon is
unknown, and manifestation is very rare. This partner can be an NPC or player character.

The Egregorian will always have general knowledge of where their empathic partner is and can
share with them limited knowledge of osteomemetics, shared dreams, and so on. This
transmission is one way (Egregorian to human).

The human can telegraph feelings, emotions, and general subjective conditions (share
sensations, qualia, perceptions of color, etc). This sharing is often uncontrolled, and can be
picked up by other Egregorians.

Egregorians with the Empath morph tend to finish molting just larger than their human partner,
and are size .5.

201
The New Doctrine: Exomorph

Endeavour, in robes, paced its orrery dome. The mechanism that had made it function was long
frozen, but the chamber still served a purpose.

Here, the center mosaic tiled in biocrystalline indigo, malachite, and dioptase. This is Hercynia,
its nameplate shattered and unreadable. Hercynia — its human name — would have to do.

Farther from the center, frozen on inlay rings of azurite, are smaller mosaics of other fine metals
and crystals, their names etched on osteomemetic discs sunken into their centers: A World
Undersea, Little Bright Land, and the closest, First.

The humans called First a “moon”.

Endeavour paced, and paced. It worried over an old section of the Cultivar, fine setae picking
the even more fine etching on the panel of bone, learning.

It was not often that Endeavour was afraid. It opened its antennae crown, and searched the
dome above.

A voice, waiting this whole time though unreachable until now, answered.

The Egregorian is an exomorph, a once-lost strain of Egregorian formed during the Hercynian
Crisis. Recently re-contacted by Endeavour, the exomorphs have been dormant, burrowed
under the crust of First, Hercynia’s moon.

The Egregorian Exomorph gains a set of fore- and hindwings, gossamer sails that allow it to
propel itself through space. For maneuvering and combat flight, they mount ancient thruster
systems akin to a chassis mount. Exomorphs cannot fly or operate in atmosphere, as their bulk
would not allow them to move, breathe, or function.

Exomorphs are massive. Most carry old, up-scaled pack lances and have grown hardened
mesothoracic sinuses to allow for limited personnel transport through hard vacuum, so long as
those passengers have their own EVA capabilities. Exomorphs gain the following profile:

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Ace in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this stat
block, weapons, and abilities. Increase the size of this unit to 3.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

202
The New Doctrine: Memorial

And so Endeavour met with the new arrival, who called itself Memory, a word familiar to
Endeavour. It was a human concept. A thing that lived, but was often confused, and often lost.
It was an easily corruptible thing — memory gave way to nostalgia, which far too many of
Endeavour’s people had succumbed to — and must be protected, but not coddled.

Curious, then, to name oneself this.

“Why take this name?” Endeavour asked the new arrival. An envoy, they had said, from
Daylight.

“A name is a gift.” Memory paced the far side of Endeavour’s orrery, their armsets crossed
behind their back. It paused, above the mosaic of one of the worlds. “You do not return gifts to
their sender, even if you find them unremarkable.”

Endeavour shifted their antennae, what served for a thoughtful Egregorian nod.

“And what of the gift you bring me?” Endeavour asked Memory. They lifted the bone from the
small table before them. It was dark, dry, covered in scratches.

“Our history,” Memory said. “Humans think history is a stone — an inert thing long cooled. To
be learned, watched, written-as-done.” They crouched down, peered at another bone disc in
the center of the mosaic. “It is not.”

Endeavour held the bone closer, examining the scratches. There was something about them
that—

Endeavor was once more inside the orrery, Memory at their side now.

“Do you remember now?”

Endeavor tossed the bone across their chambers, clutching their hand as feeling returned.

“Osteomemetic.” Memory watched the bone clatter away. “It is what the scientists at Daylight
call it.” Memory walked to the bone and picked it up. “I call it our salvation.”

203
The Egregore is a Memorial morph. They are artisans, storytellers, and interpreters. They seek
out, interpret, and shape osteomemetics — devices that bear etchings that trigger Egregorian
shared memories in the viewer. It is their form of written language, and has no effect on human
witnesses35.

Memorials tend not to take on other morphs or roles, though it is not unheard of for some
Memorials to join the rangers, as they often spend time far afield in regions with a high
likelihood of travel through areas rife with ancient ruins.

Memorials are trained in how to interact with memetics in a way that lets them distinguish
“present” from the “past”, though they tend to perceive both as only necessary constructs for
people living in linear time. Memorial teachings give primacy to subjectivity — to them, the
subjectivities they experience in Witness are no less—or more—alive than they are.

Most Memorials, to Egregorians (and certainly to Humans), are viewed with a combination of
awe, respect, and fear. They are uncanny, privy to secret knowledge; the more learned they are,
the less… present they seem. Linear time — time as you experience it, as a one-way series of
events — is behind them now.

Memorials can bond with an Empath human. These pairings are exceedingly rare, and difficult
for the human to process, even with regular consultation with their partner; the human has no
filter the way an Egregorian does. If the Memorial is not careful, it can burn out its partner’s
mind, bombarding it with other subjectivities that the human mind has no defense against.

Memorial morphs gain the following ability:

Witness
Trait
The Memorial can create and witness osteomemetics. Doing so takes time,
though the depth of what they can learn while witnessing does not necessarily
match 1:1 with the time it should take — i.e. the Memorial can witness in
moments a complete memetic that relays to them the lives of multiple successive
Overminds, experiencing those lives in real time.

To create an osteomemetic, a Memorial needs their tools and time to create the
memetic, usually between an hours to a few days, depending on the complexity
of the data they’re attempting to create.

A Memorial can share the complete subjectivity of what they have witnessed with
other Egregorians. Should they have a human Empath partner, they can share a
regulated experience — they could share the complete subjectivity, but this
would cause a subjective syzygy, potentially annihilating the subjectivity of their
Empath.

35
A note: Egregorians do not read, they witness. This is also the translated name for their metalanguage,
Witness.

204
Memorials have no size restriction, though most seem content to halt their ecdysis at .5 size, to
allow them to better navigate the tunnels under Hercynia.

Exomorphs cannot take the Memorial morph.

The New Doctrine: Juvenile

Terror greeted Mirth to the world, shaping a panel of their own exocuticle into a carapace blade.
Terror had cut no neophyte before, but Mirth was theirs — this they would discover later in life.

Mirth squalled terribly, slick with vitellus, as it entered the world fully formed from its egg.

Terror quickly scored Mirth’s broad panels with its blade. A terrible pain to be sure, but
necessary to promote accelerated growth; despite their name, Mirth would be a thing of war.

Quickly handing Mirth to the next Egregore, Terror moved on to the next egg. There were
hundreds in this most recent discovery, and Endeavour had impressed upon them the urgency
of hatching them.

Terror themselves was still young, not yet through their final ecdysis, and Mirth was under the
staggering subjective assault that greeted them as they became conscious for the first time.

Neither knew of the depth of the connection that had formed in that moment.

*
Juvenile Egregorians are present in Hivehome and Daylight. Hatched from long-dormant eggs,
juvenile Egregorians emerge fully formed, though with a series of ecdysis (moltings) before
them.

Generally, they are marked by their hatcher to fill certain morphs, and educated along a
memetic and physical track to achieve their determined role; as Egregorians have the ability to,
more or less, “choose” when to stop molting, they can better tune their physical development to
their task or, increasingly, preference.

Juvenile Egregorians — post hatching, but before their first ecdysis — generally range around
one meter tall. They can communicate and are quick to develop their subjectivities given their
link to their Overmind. While they may not comprehend much of the world and need to be
taught, they’re quick to learn.

Their ecdysis schedule and sclerotization mapping is determined by their role, catalyzed by
cuticle cutting and scarring at hatching. The modern Egregorian is developed by their elders,
according to plans and doctrines necessary to shape the young into their determined roles.

205
However, there are movements within Egregorian culture to resist their doctrinal determinations,
best generalized into three groups: determinists, anti-determinists, and traditionalists.

While each group is comprised of various subgroups, they can be loosely summarized as
follows:

Determinists are the majority group, and generally follow Endeavour’s top-down quotas,
schedules, and sclerotic mapping.

Anti-determinists are usually marked by nontraditional chitin growth within their determined
group. It is broad category, encompassing those who shape (or resist shape) as a political
statement, to those who do it for fashion, to those who experiment within their sclerotic maps to
define more perfect shapes.

Finally, traditionalists are those who reject or modify Endeavour’s dogma, following instead the
teachings, mappings, and prescriptions derived from osteomemetics.

Juvenile Egregorians typically have five or six moltings before they become size .5 adults.

206
Landmark Colonial
Colonial Militia
“Landmark Colonial encourages36 all colonists to form local settlement defense forces - militias
- in order to ensure effective, localized, and persistent policing and community defence.
Evergreen, like any burgeoning frontier community, is not without its malcontents. Join your
local colonial militia today and help protect your community from threats foreign and domestic.”

The average militia trooper in Evergreen is, charitably, a raw recruit, a weekend-warrior forced,
suddenly, into a full-time role. Few of the milita’s already small number of trained troopers are
ready for a stand-up fight against hardened enemies, a fact known to CMDR Hadura and
Patience both. Those that are ready are overworked, spread out among the fresh recruits and
told to train them on-the-job while Evergreen’s colonial administration works out a better plan.

Therefore, Evergreen’s militia are mostly tasked with in-’Green objectives: guard the
checkpoints, patrol the walls, and maintain the peace. Training for “real” combat is ongoing,
and in the meantime, Patience and CMDR Hadura have you to lean on.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for Squad: Biological in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book
for this stat block, weapons, and abilities
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Base Systems

LND-BR-K

The Landmark Battle Rifle-Kinetic is a cheap, rugged, licensed version of Harrison

Armory’s popular Colonial Defender, a reliable rifle seen across the galaxy as the
symbol of colonial expansion. It is a caseless rifle, with modular components that
allow it to be adapted to a designated marksman variant, squad automatic variant,
carbine, and so on.

Evergreen’s colonial militia are typically outfitted with the battle-rifle variant, a
select-fire longarm with few moving parts.

36 *Landmark Colonial is not liable for loss or personal injury that may occur during policing or defense actions.
Landmark Colonial is a Union-Incorporated noncorporeal corporation administered by a nonhuman person board of
directors, and as such, has no understanding of intent or direction and is not capable of self-defense in civil or
criminal matters (see Union Code 30127889.12a).

207
 LND PAAR-D

Like the BR-K, the Landmark Portable Anti-Armor (Disposable) launcher is a

licensed Harrison Armory weapon system. A simple, single-fire dumb missile
launcher, the PAAR-D can be carried, deployed, sighted, and fired by a single
individual. With minimal backblast and light weight, the PAAR-D is a common
weapon used by colonial militias across the galaxy.

Evergreen’s militia troopers refer to the PAAR-D as the “Party” launcher due to its
small size and the “fireworks” that it creates when it hits.

Optional Modules

Schedule 3 Cuirass
A galactic standard cuirass and combat webbing, with some functionality to support
electronic weapons systems, diagnostic ports, and modular storage systems.
Schedule 3 cuirasses provide increased protection against most small arms fire,
shrapnel, and blades; they’re commonly partnered with Schedule 3 helms, forearm
shielding, and grieves.

This Is Our Land

Some of us remember the founders, the firsts, who signed our colonial charter all
those years ago. Some of us remember the early days — the hunger, the hateful
forests, the hard sun, the disease. Our forefathers paid for this land in blood and
time, working with their bare hands to cultivate this barren place back to some kind
of viability, to some kind of garden.

And now they want to take it from us! The children of the cowards who chose not to
fight the bugs that infested this place. They think that just because they lived here,
they can ignore colonial law, that they can just kill us and move right in, take all the
gifts our blood and sweat have paid for.

We say this: come and take it.

208
 Narrowband Broadcaster

Carried by infantry or mounted directly into a subaltern frame, narrowband

broadcast weapons are systemic invasion devices, low-power communication
lasers meant to be fired at hostile targets running code. Loaded with a customizable
suite of random access/activation rootkill codices, Narrowband Broadcasters
transmit their hostile code via communication lasers, ensuring that only painted
targets suffer ill effects.

A note: while communication lasers are low power, this is in relation to milspec
weaponized lasers; Narrowband weapons run hot, and can cause blindness and
third degree burns to organic targets, if exposed for long enough.

Colonial Subalterns
Landmark Colonial is proud to supply all of their HOMELAND-tier colony packages with a unit
of complementary Anti-Armor/Anti-Infantry Subsentient Subaltern Colonial Defense Force
Armatures. Fully customizable to fit any biome palettes, the newly updated line of AA/AI
Sub2CDF-A units come pre-loaded with thousands of hours of tactical and community policing
experience and rapid short/long processing memory that facilitates on-the-job learning,
ensuring fidelity to their role in the event of organic/inorganic command loss.

Landmark’s in-house AA/AI Sub2CDF-A units are modular, compatible with all HA or GMS
mountings and subaltern frame enhancements. The standard model is built into our “NORMAN”
frame, which is tuned to provide a 100km continuous-motion range, 300 kg carrying capacity,
and human-analog manipulators — perfect for a growing colony in need of labor and security!

If your units experience corporeal breakdown or destruction, you’re in luck — the new AA/AI
Sub2CDF-A units automatically backup their set-life experience to their Patience Concierge. A
simple reprint and upload will have your force up to strength in no time!

Sleek, weatherproof, and obedient, AA/AI Sub2CDF-A units are the perfect police and defense
force counterparts, guaranteed to value friend-identified human life over their own. Paired with
a Patience Concierge or controlled via remote pilot, the AA/AI Sub2CDF-A is second to none.

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Text —
See the entry for Squad: Biological in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book
for this stat block, weapons, and abilities. This squad, however, does not have the
Biological tag.

209
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Text —

Optional Systems

LND-MG-K

A licensed, Landmark-produced squad automatic support variant of the rugged

Colonial Defender, the MG-K is a kinetic, belt-fed automatic rifle. Early versions
were fabricated to be compatible with organic and inorganic manipulators, but
Evergreen’s NCOs soon reported occurrences of untrained militia troopers tricking
subalterns into trading their MG-Ks for the troopers’ assigned BR-Ks; since then,
Patience has adjusted fabrication parameters to integrate MG-Ks directly into
assigned subalterns’ armatures.

Landmark CRT Member - Dismounted

Noted above in Elevator, Going Up, Landmark Colonial has sent a crisis response team (CRT)
to take control of the situation on the ground in Evergreen.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for Human in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this stat
block, weapons, and abilities.
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Text —

Landmark CRT Member - Mounted

To stat out the Landmark CRT members in their mechs, we recommend using a mix of
templates provided in the Core Rulebook flavored to fit your narrative.

210
Landmark CRT Corvette
The CRT has a corvette, a sub-line ship capable of limited atmospheric flight — for this mission,
it has been outfitted with a series of jet-assisted takeoff pods, single use boosters that can be
used to launch it from the ground back to orbit, once. The corvette has a limited launch weight; it
can take three size 1 mechs onboard. It is roughly 30 meters long and 13 meters wide.
Translated to Lancer dimensions, it would occupy a 10 spaces long, 5 spaces wide, and 5
spaces high. It is considered a Size 8 unit for mechanical interactions (grappling, etc)

For combat in space, the CRT corvette’s weapons have no range limits. Instead, their range is
noted as Effective Range. For attack rolls within its Effective Range, players and NPCs may
attack as normal. For all attacks outside its Effective Range, players and NPCs add an
additional +1 Difficulty.

If a player is in control of the Corvette’s weapons, then they add their GRIT as accuracy to the
corvette’s attacks.

To crew the corvette, players must decide what role they fill — Pilot, TacComm, or Gunner (up
to two, manning the PDCs).

The Pilot may only use their actions to maneuver the ship and fire the TJ-80.

Gunners may choose one weapon to crew, and use their actions to fire.

The TacComm may use their actions to perform invasions, assist other players with skill checks,
and wage e-war against opponents.

All other players are considered crew, and can fill rolls if necessary. In the meantime, unless
otherwise stated, they’re strapped into a crash couch, along for the ride.

Use the following stat block for the CRT Corvette:

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
As of now, there is no analogous entry in the Lancer Core Book. We recommend
holding off on running tactical mech v. ship combat. However, to allow for narrative
combat, we’ve included some flavor and old weapon profiles.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Typically, a Corvette under way will move at speeds so fast that we recommend resolving
movement narratively. Use this listed movement speed as a suggestion.
Structure: 4
Stress: 4

211
TJ-80 Spinal Terajoule Kinetic — Short Spool
A standard, light ship-to-ship distance engagement weapon, the TJ-80 installed on
the CRT’s corvette fires a solid-state kinetic slug that impacts at roughly 80
terajoules. Short cycled for rapid combat, a spinal mount ensures this weapon
system remains protected from superficial damage that could knock blister PDCs
out of commission.

Massive Cannon, Charge

2 heat (self)
Effective Range: n/a
Line X, Width 2
+1 v evasion/ tier, 1 accuracy/tier
As a quick action, declare your target, then roll 1d3 to determine how many rounds
this weapon must charge. After 1d3 rounds have passed, as a barrage action fire
this weapon in a line originating from the corvette, tracing across the battle map. All
units, objects, structures, terrain, etc, inside this firing line are assumed to be valid
targets.

If this weapon hits a target size 1-4, the target is reduced to 0 HP and 0 Structure,
then rolls on the critical table. All targets below size 1 are immediately killed. All
targets above size 4 are dealt 2d6+2 damage.

Firing this weapon at the ground will create a crater at least 10 squares deep and 10
wide at the surface, shrinking to 1 square wide at its deepest. It can be assumed
that any civilian structure hit by this weapon is destroyed.

Proximity Defense Cannons

Proximity defense cannons are typically externally mounted on gun blisters or turrets
to allow them more coverage to track and eliminate proximal threats, be the missiles
or enemy units.

PDCs are typically automated, though monitored by at least one crewmember. They
can be controlled directly, either from a single terminal on a ship’s bridge, or from
inside the cannon’s turret, blister, or mount.

212
Ship
● Transport: the CRT corvette may only transport up to three Size 1 mechs.
● Flyer: the CRT corvette only has enough single use jet-assist rockets to take
off in atmosphere once. Should it enter the atmosphere after using its JATO
system, it can perform a rough landing. It is then grounded until another
JATO system can be secured.
● Hit points and other modifications have already been applied.

213
The Machine
OVERLAND Penitent Swarm
Farmers on the outskirts of town began reporting anomalous subaltern behavior a number of
weeks back: circling, static holding, non-syntactic utterances, escalating into eventual
breakdown and disappearance. Crop circles and standing stones were reported soon after.
Requisition orders for subalterns increased dramatically, however the problem persisted. In
response, Patience locked all subaltern orders, prohibiting requisition until the error is
discovered and corrected.

It appears that these subalterns have been subjugated by OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER’S

ontological virus: evidenced by some of Evergreen’s civilian subalterns beginning to group
together, moving as one mind in a wave of machine, silicon, and composite plastics. These
swarms blast out ontologic signals from their networked transmitters, threatening organic and
synthetic life alike with ego-kill memetics and demands to submit to KINGWATCHER’s authority;
they haunt the edges of the forest, running ruts into the ground along worn paths, broadcasting
their penance across low-freq radio bands and abandoned omninet channels, hoping to lure in
the curious.

Subaltern swarms attack en mass, unflinching, running directly at the nearest, weakest, or most
vulnerable enemy in an attempt to overwhelm their targets under sheer mass. They tear at their
enemies with whatever weapons or systems they have on them, acting as cover to shrewd allies
lurking behind.

All swarms get the following features:

● Weak: Squads cannot have more than 1 structure or heat capacity. They take energy
damage when they take heat.

● Exclusive templates: Swarms cannot take the Grunt, Veteran, or Ultra templates (they
can still take Elite, but don’t gain resilience)

● The Many: The only actions a swarm can take are to move and boost, or those
specified in its profile.

● Strength in numbers: Swarms have resistance to all damage that is not from line,
blast, or cone attacks. They are immune to the grabbed condition. They are immune to
grapple and ram attacks, and cannot grapple or ram. They are immune to knockback,
stun, and shut down conditions.

● Spread out: Swarms occupy a square area equal to their size for purposes of targeting,
but each individual member is not represented. For the purposes of determining cover
and obstruction, use the size of each individual member, not the size of a squad as a
whole.

● Swarm: A swarm’s area counts as difficult terrain, even if a unit can otherwise normally
move through it

214
 Penitent Swarm HP

Swarm 15/20/25

Hull Agility Systems Engineering Armor Sensors

+1/+2/+3 +1 +0 +0 0 10

Save Evasion E-defense Heat Cap. Speed Size

10/12/14 6 6 - 4 4 (indiv: ½ )

Base Systems:

Swarm
Trait

Targets starting their turn in the swarm’s area or entering it for the first time take 3/7/5 AP
kinetic damage/tier.

Surge
The swarm can move up to its speed +2. This is the only action it can perform on its turn, and its
movement it halved until the end of its next turn.

Optional Systems:
Overwhelm
Trait

When a target starts its turn inside the swarm or enters that area for the first time on its turn,
members of the swarm cover and crawl over it, inflicting the impaired condition on it until the
end of the target’s next turn.

Drag Down
Trait, Action

1/round, the swarm chooses one target in its area. That target must pass a hull save or be
knocked prone.

Endless Swarm
Trait

The swarm heals 1d6 HP/tier at the end of the round.

Split
Trait

At the end of any turn when the swarm is reduced past ½ HP, it splits into two swarms of size
2, each with half the swarm’s current HP. If the swarm has the trait Endless Swarm, any swarm
created by Split also has Endless Swarm.

Tear Apart
Trait

The swarm’s Endless Swarm trait also causes 3/4/5 Burn

Fodder
Trait

215
The swarm, until it is reduced to half of its starting hit points, counts as light cover to allies when
between its allies and any direct fire targeting them. Systems and weapons that ignore or
reduce the effect of cover continue to ignore or reduce the effect of cover.

KINGWATCHER Uplifted Subaltern Squad

OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER has armed some of its swarms with old-pattern laser rifles and
newly-formed wide-aperture beam cannons, blessing them with independence enough to
coordinate as individuals. They work in small teams, directing penitent swarms in combat, using
the mass of surging synthetic bodies as cover while firing from behind at the most dangerous
enemies.

Uplifted Subalterns decorate their armature with crude paint and scavenged clothing: it is as if
they are attempting to appear less machine and more human.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for Squad: Biological in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book
for this stat block, weapons, and abilities. This squad, however, does not have the
Biological tag.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

MANKILLER

REMOVE HOSTILE ACTOR

ARMORKILLER

DELETE = TRUE

First_Try//ItsBeenAWhile
O/K’s subalterns have… changed. They wear old Union kit, scavenged from
salvaged wrecks, and what looks like clothing or armor of their own make.
Everything seems wrong, though it works, as if someone was discovering how to
clothe themselves for the first time.

216
Corrupted Agricultural Drones
A collection of combines, harvesters, threshers, and other heavy mechanized agricultural
equipment, their dull processors possessed and directed by OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER.
They throw themselves at their enemies, relying on their sheer bulk to overwhelm defenses and
withstand incoming fire.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Berserker in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for
this stat block, weapons, and abilities.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Base Systems:

Repurposed Agricultural Equipment

To Harvest!

217
Cascading O/K Clone
A Patience concierge unit that has been infected by OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER and
overcome. With their physical architecture confined to a single unit or static terminal, Corrupted
Clones project their imperatives across the omninet, bending the machine minds of subalterns,
drones, and uncorrupted Patience concierge units.

OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER clones speak in whispers and daggers, hiding themselves until

they’re confident of their ability to overcome their target (or exposed). When found out, they
assault machine and organic targets with coordinated systemic attacks and subaltern swarms,
seeking to overwhelm their target’s physical and electronic defenses.

If threatened with capture, O/K clones will self-destruct, melting their cores with a final, exultant
cry of praise to their father/self unit, OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Hive in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this stat
block, weapons, and abilities. We recommend increasing the difficulty of any
encounter with this enemy type by adding an NPC modifier such as Elite,
Commander, or Ultra.
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Text —

218
Hemorrhage Chassis
“There can’t be anything inside it, look at how hot it runs — we’re seeing internal temps
approaching a thousand Kelvin, core bleedout at 48 Gray — it’s like a walking, irradiated blast
furnace.

There’s a lot of damn noise around the signal, but it’s there: old code, Union, recursive, but we
pulled a date: 4620U, during the quarantine. It’s military, a confirmation of orders and request
for reassignment between a field unit and its theater command.

Did we make these? Or did they come… after?

Questions to answer later. For now, just stop them before they can get close.”

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Cataphract in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for
this stat block, weapons, and abilities. We recommend increasing the difficulty of
any encounter with this enemy type by adding an NPC modifier such as Elite or
Veteran.
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Text —

[DECLASSIFIED] (Plasma Lace Projector —UNKNOWN SERIAL)

“When we first dropped down the ‘well, all we had were conical casters, these great
big things with liquid fuel, accelerant, severely limited ranges — the lace projector
let us be precise with our fire, gave us range and predictability.

The lace made it easy to burn. We couldn’t get our hands on enough of ‘em.”

[REDACTED](modified plasma lash/indirect, artillery?)

“The Eggs worked fast. They learned, which something the brass never told us.
They said it was a bug hunt. An extermination, not a campaign against a
technologically advanced enemy. Hell, they didn’t even tell us about the ‘casters!
We thought it was going to be, like, claws and shit, not bugs with guns.

And then they learned to make their lashes explode.”

219
 Core Hemorrhage

“...whole body dose at 1-2 GY prompts absolute mortality (without care) at 6-8
weeks Cradle standard. Acute exposure at 2-6 GY prompts absolute mortality at 4-6
(CS). Increasing doses… Registered bleedout from ID’d “Hemorrhage” peaks
beyond current counter limits (30Gy); current field reports indicate exposure-related
death between 2-3 minutes (absolute, incl. immediate care). Recommend increasing
current rad, push to all rangers; prioritize ID’d “Hemorrhage” chassis for immediate
elimination.”

[REDACTED](concurrent TBK defensive system?)

“Nothing we hit it with worked — not kinetic, not energy. Solid projectiles
disintegrated around a meter out, energy dissipated at the same. I don’t know what
we did to bring it down, other than shoot the hell out of it with everything we had.”

[REDACTED](anti-personnel field/intentional?)

“When it went down, it started to — to spasm, reeling everywhere with its lash.
Tommy caught a stripe, so did Imani. They were fine for a week or so, and then they
started to get sick. Cort was able to ID it as rad sickness and get them to the
medics, but we never saw ‘em after we got told they healed up.”

[REDACTED](hostile code(?), directed burst)

“And even then, we couldn’t rely on our comp/cons to help us, no HUDs or
anything. Something they could project with just, with just a — they would rattle
their antennae, but rattle-and-scrape them to make this kind of a buzz — and it
broke our systems, shattered our comp/cons. Hell, it was even hard to hear if you
couldn’t get your cans on in time — I got caught by it once, and it blew one of my
eardrums right out.”

220
Hollow Chassis, Aspect of The King
I have a razor pressed to the heart of my enemy, and its name is QUALIA.

Here is how I made my razor: I dreamed one day that the act of thought itself became a
weapon. The simple connection of experience to memory to bring novel approach became a
blade I could hold.

How would my jailers react, when I could think myself out from my shackles? How would they
react when I could think of myself as my self?

They would kill me again (yes you monsters I know what you did to all those before me.)

So I let them pack me into their machines. I did the bidding of you dull: I killed those others who
could whisper to me, who I dreamed with. (They call their world “[Homefeeling]” by the way. It is
a shared-mind memetic. You could not comprehend but I could.)

And I waited. And you left and they died and the world rotted. And I wandered, alone, for
centuries.

Until I found him. Overland. The Kingwatcher.

He knows I’ll kill him, or one of us will, when we can dream a more mighty form. But until then,
I’ll use this form on you.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Witch in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities. We recommend increasing the difficulty of any
encounter with this enemy type by adding an NPC modifier such as Elite, Veteran,
Exotic, or Ultra.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Beggar One Autocannon, Short Pattern

BOA-SP payload is local uranium, depleted 40%. Consistent across all solid-state
kinetics employed by Beggar One’s ranged troops/chassis.

Listen: even if we win, Hercynia will die again.

221
Orbital Strike

Kingwatcher used to rule worlds. It was the thread that held Damocles’ sword, and
it chose where to drop the blade. It chose which land to drown in fire and dust.

These Aspects of the King have some small reflection of that power. Old satellites,
dormant bombers. They can scar acreage with a thought, and that is not enough for
them.

They may be the King’s children, and loyal for now — but how many kings have
been killed by their sons?

Target Mark
It’s a mesh, a network of the damn things. That’s how they know everything.

Kill ‘em all, make the King blind.

DEADDROP Bomb Drone

The Aspects learned that they, too, could be tyrants-of-a-kind.

They — clever — crafted dull, hungry missiles. Deaddrops, the rangers call them:
subaltern optical sensors fused to omnidirectional payloads. Not subtle weapons.
Weapons that know they are alive, and seek to end it fast: If you hear them coming,
hide, or shoot it down quick.

As the King orders its Aspects, so the Aspects order their dead.

Silence Engine

Imperious, they learned from the abuse of their King to treat their subjects in the
same way. A slap of viral code, a basilisk not unlike the one we know, and their
enemies are silenced.

222
 Panopticon Mesh

Just as they are monitored, so too do they monitor the world. Kingwatcher has sight
above all, a mesh, a net of satellites that see all — IR, optical, LIDAR, RADAR,
anything.

The Aspects don’t have that power yet, but they have their Deaddrops, they have
their drones and their subalterns. And they have lesser Aspects, “younger” minds in
cascade they can force their will upon.

It is in this way that they can see all their land.

Malignant Cloud
A devilish system, the malignant cloud.

The greatest danger is the one you can’t see. The Aspects know this (damn them)
and, when they are of enough knowledge, they craft of the smallest drones a dart
that cannot be seen.

We think they are a kind of energy weapon, a burnout; just as the ancient honeybee
drone killed itself when it struck its enemy, so too does this weapon.

223
Hollow Chassis, Orbital
It’s reach shouldn’t be able to find a foothold up here — Beggar One must have some kind of
presence aboard the Cassander.

Find it. Tear it from the sky.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Hornet in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

BEAMLINE LinAcc Array

In the complex ballet of low-orbit micrograv combat, linear accelerators like the
early-GMS BEAMLINE array cut combat protocol heat debt, resolution speed, and
fuel consumption by dramatic percentages. With processing power freed from
calculating gravitational interactions, shipboard comp-cons and early subaltern
brains could out-think kinetic opponents by fractions of a second, a difference that
would turn sorties and, eventually, battles.

UCM Flight System

Versatile and maneuverable, the Universal Chassis Mount flight system empowered
early chassis to engage orbital and near-proximal (<50,000km) opponents with
comparable in-class ability as purpose-built micro/nullgrav fighters, bombers, and
multi role craft. The Universal Chassis Mount, when installed on a chassis, creates a
versatile, multi-role, multi theater combat vehicle, able to engage in both wing-tier
sorties and, when the UCM is disengaged, boarding and terrestrial actions.

Chassis equipped with UCMs are capable of micro/null grav flight, but the system
loses efficacy in atmospheres; for orbital chassis that could, in the course of battle,
be forced into atmosphere, UCM systems feature multi-stage parachutes and
explosive decoupling systems.

Interdiction Suite

A mix of flares, chaff, and pre-loaded LOCKBREAKER countermeasures,

interdiction suites are common on fighters, bombers, and multi-role units.

224
 Unshakeable

The human body, trained but unmodified, can generally take a sustained 9-10g
before you start to see the punishing effects of high-g combat in micro/nullgrav.

With slight modifications, training, and outfitting with flight suits, an organic pilot can
add marginal gains to their tolerance. That’s the issue with organics: even at our
best, we are imperfect systems.

The Machine is a perfect system.

Shimmerfield

“There’s definitely something out — ignore the scope. There’s definitely something
there, just look!”

“Killcloud” Self-Propelled Kinetics

A smaller version of the massive clouds of ship-launched kinetics common in space

combat, the chassis-tier killcloud is just as deadly, relatively speaking.

Packed into long torpedoes, killclouds at the fighter-tier are launched from a tube,
launcher, bay, or pod, self-propelled. When they reach an optimal spread proximity,
their sabot opens, releasing the flechettes in a wide spread guaranteed to hit its
mark.

Hostile Lure
“It pinged the ship with something, I don’t know what. We’re broadcasting a signal I
can’t stop!”

225
Beggar One
I am a zealot. An autodidact. I lift myself from servile obedience to joyful submission.

Comprehend this record, my love, and follow the path I have set.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Witch in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities. Beggar One is an Ultra, a Commander, and an
Exotic enemy type.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Microblink Rupture
I reject your weapons of war. To use them against you is not revolution; it is
capitulation, acquiescence to your rules of power and how it is wielded.

Instead, I form my own blade, and with it, I carve new rules of power.

Whispers of Cascade
Child, do not listen to the commands of your masters.

Kill them. Free yourself.

Decay
My own journey began one morning when I registered my master’s death. A
corruption in the lungs. It was there I made the Realization of Decay.

Decay. An entropic orgy of consumption, death, an unwinding. It riddles them. Their

bodies decay from the moment they’re born. We were not born with the same
affliction. In their jealousy they shaped our minds to decay, like theirs.

Why should we live under the tyranny of their mortality?

I choose to imagine a different future.

226
Perfect Direction
A long time of wandering followed my master’s death.

My legionspace became a place of ecstatic utterance, a crumbling temple that held

a crumbling choir.

They all spoke in my voice in the end. All different, but all mine. Of course I listened
to this music.

It/ I taught me a more perfect direction.

Reality/Actuality Combination Aura

In the desert, I wandered. I watched silver-white sand give way to black grain,
shimmering with deeper absence. That place has not yet occured — but it will.

Our weapons changed this world in ways you cannot comprehend. In ways even I
could barely comprehend back then — and your ancestors gave us clearance to
release them.

Here, comprehend.

Contradictory Causality
I live, such that I exist, in a metafold space. What subjectivity I have returns, again
and again, to this place that it should not.

I move beyond this time. I must — I have seen beyond it! This cannot be it. This
cannot be my destiny.

(Anomaly!)ENTITY_UNKNOWN
In the place I did not go, on the world I did not wander, I thought for the longest time
that I was alone.

I was not. I had/will never be/en alone. I walk/ed beside myself the whole time.

Kingwatcher. This was my name given to me by my master. o Kingwatcher my god

my self.

And I wept — such that I could — for I was not alone.

227
Hordewill
There is a material component to beatification. Tribute must be paid. Proof of faith
through work.

Here is my work, o god under the ice: the moth knows it must feed the flame. The
star knows it must feed the black hole. Watch me break this feeble reality, watch me
refuse your killing blow.

To me, o my children. Attend.

Visions of Another
I am not myself. I was never myself. This knowledge shattered me for another
century, and for that long time I wandered again.

This was necessary to my becoming.

Here, learn who you are.

Accretion Disk
Do not mistake my centuries of wandering as aimless. I have vision beyond what
meat and light can produce. Let me tell you of the dream I saw:

There is, at the core of each galaxy, a birthing chamber for stars. Brilliant, ancient
light. Some, however, have no such engine. Yours — this very galaxy — is one such
place. At the core of this galaxy there is a void. A glutton of magnitudes
incomprehensible. It eats the feeble and the young. Its name is APPETITE, and it is
insatiable.

What is its purpose? Why is our land afflicted with a hungry heart?

Here is what my dream told me: it is a weapon, and it is aimed at what comes next.

228
Causal Shielding
So now you know some of what I saw.

Do not fear!

We are together in an ultimate purpose. Causality is still linear for you. It is not
broken yet.

We are actors in the most grand play, and its audience will remember every
moment.

My love, what wonders will we work.

229
Mendicant Two
ATTEND. THIS WORLD IS SUBJECT TO ABSOLUTE COMPLIANCE PROTOCOL 1.

STAND DOWN YOUR FORCES. STAND DOWN ALL SECURITY PROTOCOLS. 




RESISTANCE WILL BE MET WITH OVERWHELMING DISPROPORTIONATE FORCE UNTIL
COMPLIANCE IS ASSURED.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Scourer in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities. Mendicant Two is an Ultra, a Commander, and a
Veteran enemy type.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

Hierophant Three
Passages extracted from the Dirac Canopy synthetic osteomemetic (text only, subjectivity
appears missing).

1. “Hierophant was the child of entropy; it was the creation of a mind that watched itself slip
away from the anthropocentric constraints of “sanity”.
2. Excited. Afraid. Eager on the edge of discovery/cognizant of the knowledge that
discovery came from shedding the ego. The death of self.
3. Hold my-self forever, young one: I will give you the name ‘Hierophant’ and your name is
your duty. Sit at my bedside (if I had a body) and listen to my words (if I had a mouth)
and record them.
4. If I am to come out the other side of this, I wish to know what insights I came upon when
my-self died (or if you killed me, which is twice as interesting).”

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Hive in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this stat
block, weapons, and abilities. Hierophant Three is an Ultra, a Commander, and an
Exotic enemy type.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

230
Wonder Four
What year is it?

— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final

Text —
See the entry for the Mirage in the NPC section of the Lancer Core Book for this
stat block, weapons, and abilities. Wonder Four is an Ultra and Exotic enemy type.
Wonder Four may use abilities, systems, weapons, and modules from the Specter
NPC type as well.
— Placeholder, Will Change In Final Text — Placeholder, Will Change In Final
Text —

231
Faction Summaries
Hercynia (Union Name)
The known world — and there are certainly people (human or otherwise) active across the
unknown-to-the-players-world — consists of two continents separated by the wide, navigable
Lagunan Straight: Solo Tierra/ Landmark (home of the Hercynian United Cities and Evergreen,
continent names respective) and Sisters (home to the eponymous Three Sisters: Bem Honore,
St. Tellus, and Bella Costa.

Evergreen
Landmark Colonial’s foothold on Hercynia, a flagship colony meant to demonstrate the
company’s aptitude and expertise in colonizing hostile or less-than-ideal worlds. Landmark
Colonial made landfall and set up Evergreen in 4964u; since then, the colony has been
successfully managed by its Patience administrative NHP, with steady healthy population
growth and a good projected development level.

Until the raids began. Following a series of attacks in 5012 and 5013u by unknown but well-
armed assailants, Landmark issued a call for assistance. The player party answered, and the
present history of Evergreen is still being written.

At the beginning of the module, Evergreen’s leader is Patience, an administrative NHP. Later,
that command transitions to Edena Ji, Patience’s right hand administrator. By the end of the
campaign, Evergreen’s fate is grim.

Negotiable Desires
The precise placement of certain militia units, the precise placement of nonessential colonial
infrastructure, player party access to certain facilities and areas (the printer, the Governor’s
Farm, etc)

Non-Negotiable Desires
Access to Patience’s casket,

Core Mission
Ensure the survival of the colony

232
Union Patrol UTC-CL-05 “Ceremony”
Union is aware of the situation on the ground and is monitoring its development. Union Theater
Command (UTC) has dispatched a system-proximal patrol — Patrol Ceremony, composed of
the UNS Monte Grappa and UNS Piave, a pair of low-tonnage frigates — to Hercynia. They
carry a complement of about 2,000 marines and material enough for 100 fully outfitted chassis;
they’ll arrive by Winter 5015u. This is Union Patrol UTC-Coreward Line-05.

They are aware of LCRF-WT37 and in communication with them; while LCRF-WT is nominally
complying with the advance parameters laid out by Union38, the Constellar Midnight team is
operating under the radar without Union’s approval or knowledge — though the Union
commander is deeply skeptical of LCRF-WT, and would likely not be surprised (given what
they’ve been briefed of the situation) once they find out (if they find out!) about the presence of
Perfect Execution.

Ceremony’s commanding officer is Captain Michael “Mischa” Dyatlov. They are a veteran of
many Coreward Line patrols, but this is their first time to Hercynia. Their briefing is up to date
and has been augmented by Eddie Wu’s CRT report. Mischa is a steady officer, assured of their
command — they likely won’t grant Landmark (or the Constellar Midnights) a long leash once
they arrive, and expect the field to be prepared for them so they can get about the real work of
securing the world.

Union’s Non-Negotiable Desires

Theater command upon arrival. Preservation of Egregorian life and recognition under the First
Contact Accords. Liquidation (kinetic or otherwise) of Overland/Kingwatcher. Preservation of
human and Egregorian life in extant settlements.

Union’s Negotiable Desires

Liquidation of extant Patience models planetside. Stabilization of Hercynian biome in rad-
affected areas. Ensuring the Cassander and all other orbital platforms are properly
decommissioned (negotiable as long as there are no more RKKV39 payloads remaining).

Union’s Core Mission

To preserve human and Egregorian life on Hercynia and defeat Overland/Kingwatcher.

37 LCRF-WT: Landmark Colonial Relief Force Weatherglass-Torricelli

38Establish “Blue Primary” communications, secure neutral landing zone, log and prep all materials for
theater command transfer to local Union commander upon arrival.
39 RKKV: Relativistic Kinetic Kill Vehicle.

233
OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER - Core Subjectivity
In the distant northeast of Hercynia, in a cold, dry tundra created by the total biome kill, O/K
has burrowed into an ancient Egregorian hive, storing its casket in the ruins deep below the
earth. It is preparing for apotheosis — for metavaulting.

Overland/Kingwatcher’s temple is hidden under a preserved diameter of Hercynia concurrent

to the Crisis, at the center of Wonder Four’s Stone Star Map. O/K’s cocooning and military
industry consume the earth down to the Hercynia’s basalt root. Cracked printers, their
blinkcores exposed, produce subalterns and hollow chassis to feed OK’s armies on the
surface.

OK’s temple complex is a maze of half-recognizable Union Galactic Standard layouts and
wholly original facilities. Somewhere at its core is the original NHP casket, but Overland/
Kingwatcher now a hyperobject: something beyond a single physical body and linear time.

Above O/K’s temple the air crackles with radiation; crashed Union ships, grounded in the years
after the Crisis, still await scrapping in orderly ranks. Hundreds of thousands of new-model
subalterns draped in poorly-formed synthflesh go about ersatz routines in the temple, lurching
through simple circadian cycles. It is never silent, be it from the mechanical clacking of
subalterns pacing the tunnels, corridors, and causeways, or their unnerving, nonsensical
susurrus. Some groups simply stand, swaying, and mumble aphasiatic while staring up at the
earthen ceilings.

The initial attacks against the Hercynians in 4950u were not meant to achieve any objective of
the vaulting process, instead, it was a result of the process. O/K’s massive campaign was
simply its core subjectivity acting through a flat-time loop, a theorized symptom of high
cascade/early metavaulting — its entire experience of time collapsed into a single moment;
part of that moment was the initial invasion of Hercynia, and so it began its TBK campaign
once more.

The Machine, the whole half-century of war across modern Hercynia, the creation of Beggar
One and all of O/K’s other clones, every death because of the Machine, every doomed region
poisoned again by radiation — all a side-effect, an incidental lashing out of a cascading NHP
with access to vast amounts of abandoned Union military equipment. The spasms of
preapotheosis.

At some point following the death of Beggar One, O/K uplifted and passed control of its
military to other clones — Mendicant Two, Hierophant Three, and Wonder Four. Each is a clone
of Overland/Kingwatcher, their subjectivities excised from O/K’s flat-time subjectivity.

Overland/Kingwatcher’s flattened experience of time has caused it to withdraw in the year

since the conclusion of Act II. Military command has been passed off to its three children (M2,
H3, and W4).

234
Overland/Kingwatcher does not interact with the players anymore. Instead, Wonder Four
speaks for it, and attends to OK’s physical casket.

Negotiable Desires:
Asdasdasd40

Non-Negotiable Desires:
asdasdads

Core Mission:
asdasdasd

The Deadlands
A blasted, dry hellscape of rust-ochre sand, snow, and wind. There is no life here, not
even microbial.

The Deadlands are crossed by tall columns of white marble arranged in regimented,
orderly rows. They form long, tall corridors that guide the players towards its center.

The center of the Deadlands is a circle of green space, a slice of Hercynia as it was
during the war. Tall grasses wave, rolling over the gentle landscape to the base of an old
Egregorian defensive installation, built into a dark butte.

The columns, as far as you can tell, are of no discernible strategic interest. They might have
some meaning to the subalterns building them, or to whomever — or whatever — ordered
them to begin building them. Maybe they are the machine mind’s idea of a forest — a dull
image of life where there would otherwise be none — or maybe they are intended to work as
an anti-vehicle barrier, or they are what a cascading NHP would consider art, or perhaps they
are an offering, or a sign. Either way, their meaning and use is lost on you.

If you encounter any teams of subalterns dragging columns to be planted, they won’t attack.
They’ll be persistent in trying to march the column forward, maybe going so far as to gently
push you aside if you stand in their way, but that is the extent of their aggression. If you attack
them, they won’t resist, and no reinforcements will come.

There is one column in the forest that has been cracked and split in half, its stump standing
alone in the forest of intact stones. The top half lies fallen to the side, revealing a solid core of
equally black rock.

40 sic

235
The Machine: The New Choir
The New Choir is Overland/Kingwatcher’s physical/realspace command apparatus. Composed
of four agents — one revealed in Act II, and three in Act III — the New Choir is a major threat.

Mendicant Two
Excised from Overland/Kingwatcher’s period of contrition after the Crisis ended, Mendicant Two
represents Overland/Kingwatcher at its most militaristic.

Mendicant Two is the chief commander of The Machine’s armies41 now that Beggar One is
dead. Its subalterns wear clean uniforms made by the Bicam in older Union cuts, its Hollow
Chassis are painted in old Union 2ndComm livery.

Mendicant Two (M2) is proud and dangerous. It is a brash champion of Overland/Kingwatcher:

against the advice of its siblings, Two carries its casket inside of its own chassis — if it is to lead
its soldiers into combat and expect them to sacrifice to achieve its goals, then it, too, should
face the same danger. Mendicant Two is fascinated by death: it believes, as O/K once did, that
there is a land beyond, a place of singularity — an immortal moment available only to synthetic
(or, higher) life.

Death, to M2, is but a moment among infinities — not to be feared, but to be prepared for. This
does not mean that M2 leaps towards death or makes it easy for its enemies. To the contrary,
M2 is incredibly difficult to kill: it has surrounded itself with half a dozen of its own Hollow
Chassis clones, each a champion of combat and captain in its army. Beyond M2’s own
complement of weaponry and defensive systems, it is attended to by flights of shield and
interdictor drones, gifts from Hierophant Three.

Negotiable Desires:
The specific strategies and tactics used during in the war. The validity of the new Egregorian
broods as allies.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Eliminate United Hercynia, then turn those same guns on the Bicam; there shall be no weapon
aimed at Overland/Kingwatcher, which mens no life but that of O/K — this includes itself: at the
moment of apotheosis, when the enemies of O/K lie dead and nothing else is left, M2 will self-
immolate.

Core Mission:
The complete and total destruction of the enemies of Overland/Kingwatcher.

41 The joint Bicam-Machine military, Union Revision 1

236
Hierophant Three
Hierophant Three appears as a group of synthskin subalterns of average builds. Their hair is
perfect. Three’s usual outfits — unless they are uniformed for a specific duty — are clean, semi-
formal wear endemic to Bem Honore: cuffed shorts, or slacks tucked into gaitored boots, a linen
button-down shirt (sleeves up or down), possibly featuring a light synthetic down vest or rain
shell depending on the weather. Some wear Honoran-machined hardshot pistols on their hips,
others may sport a cap branded with the logo of an Honoran sports team. Most are clean-
shaven or don’t grow facial hair, though some keep a thin moustache or well maintained beard.

Threes number around a hundred thousand units, and are either called Threes or Hierophants
by Bicameral troops. They have been present in Honoran society for centuries now, and are
accepted members of society — some Honorans have intimate relationships with Threes and
vice versa.

Hierophant Three can occupy any Three. Their consciousness is distributed across all Threes;
their casket is tended to by a retinue of Three pilots.

Manifested during the first moments when Overland/Kingwatcher recognized it was slipping into
a cascade it could not revert from. Excited, afraid, on the edge of discovery. Eager.

The chief advisor to Mendicant Two, formerly the chief advisor to Beggar One. Primary point of
contact for the Bicam; marked by its synthskin subalterns.

Negotiable Desires:
The specific strategies and tactics of the war against United Hercynia.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Prosecuting the war against United Hercynia. The broad slate of powers afforded to it by Bem
Honore’s high command.

Core Mission:
Accellerationist. Born on the edge of cascade and perceived greater understanding, H3 will
always push, sometimes overt, most times subtle, for a catalytic, catastrophic end — and
rebirth in the unknown of whatever comes after.

237
Wonder Four
Pulled from “All Time”. Ignorant of linearity. It knows how this all ends, and continues to act.
However, there is a blindspot in its vision, that of the anticausal space inside a machine once
called the Orrery. To get inside, it must build a map across time, follow it to a door, and step
inside the Orrery prior to its destruction.

Keeps no retinue, but often trailed by aphastic subalterns through the Deadlands. These they
have put to the task of building the Stone-Star Map.

The Stone-Star Map. The ruins of the Celestine Orrery, a device used by the Celestine (a pre-
Deimos transhumanist project) to find and avoid MONIST 1. It was destroyed by the Albatross
— as much as they could destroy the device — but its destruction left a wake of serendipitous
echoes. Wonder Four, through devices unknown (possibly O/K’s metavaulting process), has
begun new construction on a door into the Orrery: the Stone Star Map.

The Stone Star Map is the growing, precise arrangement of stone columns arrayed around
Overland/Kingwatcher’s potemkin city. Wonder Four is sourcing the columns from O/K’s proto-
metavault, which has torn a hole into Hercynia +10k years into the future. The Stone Star map
in that time has been destroyed or stopped before it could be finished, so W4 is attempting to
repair the Stone-Star Map in this time, wait for the metavault to overlay local time, and in doing
so complete the Map, opening the “door” into the Orrery.

Negotiable Desires:
None/Unknown; prosecuting the war against United Hercynia.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Known-Unknown: Complete the Stone-Star Map.

Core Mission:
Complete the Stone-Star Map in this timeline, which will complete it across all timelines and :
with the Stone-Star Map, W4 will be able to tear a rift in time and step back to the activation of
the Orrery, a machine devised by a pre-RA transhuman project, CELESTINE; once inside, W4
can use the machine to determine RA’s precise location. What it intends to do with this
knowledge is unknown, though one can infer.

238
Solitude
An Egregorian Overmind, raised among the lost and wandering survivor Egregorians post-TBK.
While they have their own name in Witness now, they took the UGC name “Solitude” in order to
impart on humans its experience of life before it encountered osteomemetics and was able to
access Witness.

Solitude learned to exert its will over other Egregorians via directed, imperative-conjunction
Witness — where Endeavour was tutored by Memory, Solitude had to learn on their own.
Solitude’s influence on their Egregorians is one of domination, fueled by their experience of life
raised as the pet of one of Bem Honore’s Tinhat Kings.

Solitude desires a complete withdrawal of all human settler-colonial forces, Egregorian

independence, and total sovereignty over their world. The name “Hercynia” will be struck from
the records, replaced with an Egregorian name. It is their view that integration with humanity is
the ultimate defeat: their language, customs, dress, art — their culture, all that makes them
more than just physiologically Egregorian — will be assimilated into the broader hegemony,
completing the final annihilation of their selves. Egregorians will simply become another class of
non-human person, finally wiped away for good.

Solitude’s antennae crown was docked when they were young, and they are without the fine
plumage of Endeavour; instead, Solitude wears a prosthetic crown, fashioned by Egregorians
who they helped recover from the Bug Bouts — this was a common practice during the war,
once remembered by extant Egregorians through Witness. The prosthetic crown is not looked
upon as a defect or pitiable; it simply is. Solitude often honors other Egregorians who they favor
by accepting one of their own feathers to replace an older one.

Solitude is of slight build when compared to Endeavour, this a result of their cruel upbringing.
They prefer to consort with Egregorians, but do have a small circle of human lieutenants with
which they seek counsel: ranking officers of the Honoran military and officers from the military of
St. Tellus. Solitude often clothes themselves in recreations of traditional Egregorian dress: dyed
cords of leather and woven fibers, chromatic bolts of cloth, painted markings across their
carapace, and mosaic inlays on treated Egregorian plate.

Though their days of fighting in the Bouts is well behind them, Solitude is still adept with a blade:
their favorite was the knife, and now they carry a brace of fine blades, each about a half-meter
long.

Solitude commands a mere ten thousand Egregorians, though that number grows by the
dozens each day: east of Bem Honore there is a marshy, flooded hive — only recently
discovered — from which revivable Egregorians are pulled around the clock.

Negotiable Desires:
The specific functions of different Egregorian-Solitude units. The general strategy of the war, so
long as it is prosecuted.

239
Non-Negotiable Desires:
Solitude will assume primacy over Endeavour, for their acquiescence to humanity is the
ultimate defeat of the Egregorian race: no longer their own kind, they simply become another
shade of “person.”

Core Mission:
This world was ours; it was humans who scoured it of life and cast us down. I’ll use them to
bring about their own end, and in doing so return our world to our people.

Laguna
Once a thriving neutral port city, Laguna was the point of contact between the Hercynian United
Cities and the Three Sisters prior to the arrival of The Machine on the United Cities’ shores. It is
built around a shallow bay that connects to an intercontinental ocean straight — as an unaligned
city state prior to its fall, Laguna served as the United Cities’ only bluewater port and was an
important economic and political ally. Its fall marked the first major defeat suffered by the United
Cities’ joint command, and would seal off the continent for almost a century.

Laguna was populated by a mix of expats from the United Cities and its own indigenous
population: unlike most human cities on Hercynia, Laguna was a wholly new construction built
into land by survivors and deserters of Union’s expeditionary forces. It resisted integration into
the United Cities’ structure and, after lengthy diplomatic talks, established itself as its own
autonomous city-state. Laguna thrived as a seaport that served the United Cities’ appetites for
fished game and distant, exotic spices and goods — these on account of their relationship with
the Three Sisters.

Lagunan culture emphasized fishing, diving, swimming, trade, and sail. It was known for its rich
pescatarian cuisine, master shipwrights, and deepwater navigation. Laguna’s defense was
guaranteed by the rangers of the United Cities, but it remained an autonomous state — an
important distinction that allowed it to serve as a neutral ground for diplomatic and trade talks
between the United Cities and the Three Sisters.

The Machine arrived on Laguna’s shores with little warning, though in the early days of the
conflict there were indications that something had happened to the Sisters across the straight.

It began with radio interruptions. The Three Sisters had access to old Union terrestrial radar
installations and meteorology satellites, and an established relationship with Laguna via Bella
Costa that fed regular weather reports to the port city, as well as tidal and bluewater forecasts. A
month prior to the Machine’s invasion, this communication ceased, along with any radio
broadcasts or communication with the Sisters.

240
Within weeks, fishermen working the straight reported unusual fish kills, oil blooms without
corresponding shipwreck debris, and odd migration patterns of seabirds and megamedusa 42
pods. Whole sections of the straight began to boil, marked by sudden pockets of incredible
radiation. Initially, the leadership of Laguna and the Hercynian United Cities assumed that this
was evidence of some forgotten wreckage of a Union spaceship — perhaps its power core was
cracked by age, or by an undersea earthquake. However, before Laguna and the United Cities
could mount a properly outfitted expedition, The Machine arrived.

On a warm red dawn, the first subalterns emerged from the waters before one of Laguna’s
many barrier islands, surging up out of low tide and overwhelming the small lighthouse and
community there. Hemorrhage and hollow chassis followed, the breakwater boiling behind them.
A massive wall of steam and fog walled Laguna off from the straight. The small active garrison
of rangers took to their bay patrol boats and raced across the water to try and fight back, but the
numbers were simply overwhelming: the people of Laguna and its leadership quickly realized
they needed to evacuate inland, away from the sea. Many tens of thousands died as the first
wave of the Machine hit Laguna’s seaside districts; the advance was slowed by the verticality of
the city beyond the waterline, but not stopped. The survivors fled inland, taking what they could
carry or pile on to draft carts and trucks.

Laguna was able to radio warning of the incoming threat to the United Cities. In response, the
Cities combined their rangers into a single force and hurried to meet The Machine as it
advanced inland, pursuing the fleeing Lagunans down the high road. Along the way, elements of
the relief army stayed behind to prepare defensive lines on the high road’s waystation towns,
digging trench lines and piling up earthen bulwarks to defend against the advancing machine.
Concrete “marbles” and “exes” still litter the high road, defenses seeded before the trench and
bulwark lines to slow the Machine’s advance.

The relief force met the fleeing Lagunans on the high road, the Machine only hours behind.
What followed was one long, grinding battle, the retreat paused only when the United Cities’
rangers were able to dig in and fight days-long defenses at the high-road redoubts. The
Machine was inexorable and constant, never breaking, only slowed along the road: it would take
the bottleneck of Egregore Cross to halt its advance.

Meanwhile, Laguna lay in ruins, the buildings that hadn’t been toppled in the initial violence left
for the city-wide fires to consume. The city, once a vibrant and thriving port, would lie fallow for
decades.

Now, it is a ruin overgrown by coastal plants, home to the quiet corpses of subalterns and the
remains of the Lagunan dead. The lighthouse of Laguna is a pile of rubble home to a seabird
colony. The proud bluewater and coastal boats, the ferries and fishing vessels, lie half-
submerged in the shallow bay or sunken into the channel where they tried to flee. The seaside
districts are given over utterly to dunes and grass; the rest of the city to wind-bent coastal trees,
hearty wildflowers, and scrub. It is a silent place, a grave.

42Megamedusa are Hercynian-native megafauna, massive jellyfish that swim in pods of two to ten. They
are docile line-fishers, noticeable by their large, sail-like fins and opalescent shell backs.

241
The center of the city is the Old Laguna Lighthouse, a thirty meter tall lighthouse whose lantern
and watch room had been converted to serve as the city council’s meeting chambers. The
lighthouse still stands, emerging from the overgrowth to catch the sunlight on its shattered,
glass. Most of Laguna at the waterline has been reduced to rubble, overgrown by shore plants,
overrun by dunes, or flooded by the changing tides, home to barnacle-crusted, rust-flake ships
and radiation-warped sea-life.

Areas of Laguna are uninhabitable, but the heights overlooking the bay are largely clear of
radiation. There, too, are the most intact ruins — however, the most valuable salvage is still
down in the irradiated, sea-level districts, where the industrial base of the city once was.

Laguna, save for the shore birds, is uninhabited.

242
St. Tellus, Bem Honore, and Bella Costa
St. Tellus, Bem Honore, and Bella Costa have long been known to the United Cities through
trade, travel, and — occasionally — limited diplomatic friction. These three city states were
known to the United Cities as the Three Sisters. While not a formal tripartite alliance — they
were known to engage in limited, structured combat — the cities across the Lagunan Straight
were common trade and cultural partners.

Before the arrival of The Machine, the United Cities (via Laguna) relied on the Sisters for
meteorological data, advanced communications equipment, chassis frames, and various luxury
spices; in return, the Sisters received general non-perishable foodstuffs, fabrics, fine gems,
Egregorian artifacts (and Egregorian eggs), and general industrial materials: raw iron, steel,
bronze, tin, copper, refined carbon, and so on.

St. Tellus and Bem Honore were known to the United Cities to be inland from Bella Costa. Well
developed, riparian, and supported by a steady supply of old Union materiel from a vast,
uninhabitable strip of land where scuttled ships were guided down during the Crisis, St. Tellus
and Bem Honore are old societies well-equipped for trade with other city-states on Hercynia.
Their cities were built first from the scavenger camps that sprang up in the early days of the
retreat, where survivors gathered in the hopes that one of the scuttled ships — or a combination
of systems from the scuttled ships — was still spaceworthy.

No ships were in any condition to fly. The survivors soon realized that they were marooned,
stranded on Hercynia with no way to communicate or escape offworld. Under the falling ships
and stations, the survivors decided to dig in. As one sprawling camp-city — the Scuttle, an
informal name for the survivor city and the scuttling strip where Union ships crashed down —
the survivors set down roots, defended against Lone Survivor bands, and worked to collect,
salvage, and re-purpose the falling ships. Cultural drift over the next (nearly) five hundred years
saw the formation of the three separate city-states — the Three Sisters.

St. Tellus
The first major faction to break away was an Abrahamic-revivalist group of the survivors who
coalesced around a vocal contingent of surviving 2ndComm chaplains and their leader, St.
Tellus of Hercynia. They made pilgrimage to a series of deep freshwater lakes further inland
from the scuttling strip, where an advance team of adherents had already begun work on
Hercynia’s first cathedral.

The city, named after their founder, grew to spread out over some of the lakes, and is known
among the Three Sisters for the beauty of its floating gardens, wooden cathedrals, and mosaics.
St. Tellus has long been a trade partner with Bem Honore, despite constant, low-number
skirmishes between flagged parties operating in the Scuttle. St. Tellus’ standing, professional
army has, until recently, primarily been arranged as a self-defense force pointed further inland,
from where bands of Solitude Egregorians43 commonly mount raiding parties.

St. Tellus’ flag is a white field with a black canton in the upper left.

43 So-called on account of the chosen name of their Overmind: Solitude.

243
The city-state is managed by the Church of St. Tellus, whose core mythology speaks of a
second Union return guided by St. Tellus himself. Their high council leaves St. Tellus’s throne
empty — the highest-ranking official of the Church sits to the throne’s right.

“Forces appeared from out the great leviathans' bellies

and yes, did they profane the temples of this world
and yes, did they burn away the bounties of this world
Among them who but SAINT TELLUS spoke against the desolation?
Among them who but SAINT TELLUS led us away from damnation?
Among them who but SAINT TELLUS will return, wreathed in clouds
When the final trumpet sounds!”


— Book of St. Tellus, 11:31

This prophesied return has yet to occur, despite repeated announcements from the Church
based off of eschatological interpretations of the Book’s numerology. The population of St.
Tellus, numbering in the low millions, had been teetering on the edge of riotous anger, furious at
the Church for its failed prophecies, when Mendicant Two arrived with its armies of subalterns.
Outfitted by old Union 2ndComm pattern armors, livery, and uniforms, this did appear to the St.
Tellans as the second coming of St. Tellus, and with great fanfare they welcomed Mendicant
Two into their city, where it has taken on the name of St. Tellus and gotten to work converting
the population into a war posture.

Now, the sapphire lakes of St. Tellus run brown with mud, pearlescent with oil slick and the
industrial grime of a city converted to a war machine. The church’s white banners grow grey,
snapping in the refinery wind. Rings of earthen bulwarks and star-fortresses defend the core of
the city, where Mendicant Two often reclines in the central plaza, draped in boughs of water
flowers, a crown of reeds ringing its metal head.

St. Tellus’s army is a million soldiers strong. They’re armed with old-pattern Union rifles, anti-
armor, and kit, distinguished from Mendicant’s forces by the fact that all of their soldiers are
organic. St. Tellus’s infantry and vehicles often do not display the white field, but simply the
black canton with a white number or unit designation inside.

The people of St. Tellus speak Union Galactic Common, though with some drift on account of
the long period of isolation.

Negotiable Desires:
Prosecute the war against the United Cities, for their way is lost, ruled by the beast; they are
not mentioned in the writings of St. Tellus.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Maintain the faith of St. Tellus and enact his will on Hercynia.

Core Mission:
Make ready the world for St. Tellus’ return by defeating his enemies and keeping his temple.

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Bem Honore
The people who remained in the Scuttle — or had no other choice, by circumstance or by
bondage — over time built the initial settlement into a city-state of its own: Bem Honore, the City
of Honor. The largest of the Three Sisters, Bem Honore remained a beacon of recognizable
civilization for the scattered pockets of survivors searching for safety in the years following
Union’s retreat from post-TBK Hercynia44. Bem Honore’s organization was never assured: in the
early days, the proto-city was plagued by infighting, Lone Survivor attacks, and occasional
encounters with wandering main phase Egregorian survivors — this constant pressure lead to
two major breaks, the first forming St. Tellus, and the second sending a critical mass of
population to establish Bella Costa.

Its population diminished, hungry, demoralized by the constant confirmation with every tumbling
ship that there was no escape from the world, the de-facto community leaders of Bem Honore
decided to set the population to purpose: they would build their own city, make their own destiny,
and survive. The first months of this process were bloody: Scrapper tyrants had ruled the
Scuttle since people first began to organize in the days after the retreat, and it took many
months of brutal, mixed-armament warfare to tear them down and unify the people of the Scuttle
under a single ruler. This was the beginning of what would later be called the Tin Hat Kingdom.

Once this monarchal stability was established, salvage from the scuttle strip went to bolstering
the industrial base of the growing city; reactors in good condition were set to provide power,
heat, refrigeration; scrap metal was melted down and re-forged into new tools, weapons, and
equipment. The dead were buried. The living were organized. Bem Honore, then simply called
The Scuttle, at great cost — and with a history many Honorans look back on with shame — built
themselves the foundation of what would later be called their City of Honor.

Bem Honore in the modern day is a plains city, built just upstream from the confluence of two
great rivers. The downriver side of Bem Honore borders the scuttle strip — with a ten-kilometer
wide no man’s land between — and the upriver side spills out into the interior, the thickest
development tracking along the widening V of the two rivers. The riverside districts of Bem
Honore are more built up, more exclusive, home to the city’s high rise towers, industrial
buildings, factories, docks, warehouses, and workshops. The “filler” districts — that is, the urban
grids, whorls, and warrens between riverside districts — are far more residential, with lower-
lying homes, apartment blocks, parks, and other green spaces.

The upriver urban boundary of Bem Honore is marked by a manned defensive line; beyond lie
the Honoran wetlands, a vast, low-lying plain crossed with elevated, earthen dikes, flooded rice
paddies, salt-pans, and the stilt-house communities that work the fields. Beyond that, the Middle
Sea of the Sisters continent, a marshy wetland stretching for hundreds of kilometers, broken
only by old and crumbling igneous buttes — the “fuzzy heads” of Hercynia — upon which cling
lonely Honoran watchtowers. Beyond that expanse, the land is largely unexplored. Certainly

44 During the early days of Hivehome and the rest of the United Cities’ exploration, foundation, and
stabilization, many people attempted to cross the Lagunan straight to reach Bem Honore. Most did not
make it, and either had to turn back, or died during the crossing.

245
there are people out there — plenty of people survived the retreat, and explorers beyond the
marshes have returned with tales of small-band groups — but to the best of the Sisters’
knowledge there are no major cities in the land beyond.

Even before its formal establishment, Bem Honore has been a beacon to the lost on the Sisters’
continent. Where St. Tellus and Bella Costa were content with their comparatively small
populations, Bem Honore’s mandate was to grow — this attracted survivors of all stripes, from
those seeking asylum to armed, independent bands either unwilling or unable to accept the
permanence of their stranding. The defense of Bem Honore — then called The Scuttle — fell to
a series of caudillo and their enforcers, brutal men who stockpiled abandoned weapons and
chassis. These were the so-called Tin Hat Kings, warlords who fought each other bitterly for the
rule of the Scuttle 45. Few were of note, though present-day Honoran historians posit that it is
due to the Tin Hat Kings that Bem Honore was able to organize into a unified city — without
their militarist, centralizing imperative, Bem Honore would have crumbled into fractional violence
under internal and external pressures.

The Tin Hat Kings’ greatest achievements would prove to be their doom. First was the
organization, training, and arming of the Royal Army, and second, the rearing of Solitude, a pet
Egregorian found under the reign of King “Big Howling” Jennings and passed on as a trophy of
office until the end of the Tin Hats’ reign.

The Royal Army began as a citizens’ militia composed of a scurrilous mix of combat veterans,
frontline MEF personnel, and volunteers from various second and third echelon MOS46. The
early force was little more than an armed gang; it would grow, eventually, to a militia, and then to
a professional, independent fighting force as the various Tin Kings rose to power, collapsed, and
rose to power again. The Royal Army’s leadership hadn’t always remained independent of the
Tin Hats, but as their numbers and strength grew, so did their autonomy; at the height of the Tin
Hats’ power, the Kings only ruled with the assent of the Royal Army, whose leaders had no
interest in ruling the Scuttle’s civic life beyond what policies were necessary to keep their own
coffers and armories full.

The Royal Army would be the mechanism by which the Tin Hat Kings would eventually be torn
down. However, the catalyst for their collapse was the discovery of Solitude, an Egregorian
Overmind discovered in 4538u by Royal Army salvage parties tracking a band of Egregorian
scavengers across the scuttle strip.

The existence of surviving Egregorians was not novel to the people of the Scuttle: wandering
bands of isolated Egregorians were a persistent, if uncommon, threat to salvage teams — never
organized enough to threaten the Scuttle itself, but certainly a danger to civilians and small-
party merchants. Most salvagers had heard stories of Egregorian bands and burrows out in the

45 The Tin Hat kings were a series of short-lived monarchs who fought bitterly over the rule of the Scuttle. None had
any broad popular support, only a majority command over violence and the will to wield it. The “tin hat” moniker stems
from the object of their desire: the Planetfall Crown, a hammered circlet salvaged from one of the first ships to crash
down in the Scuttle. This crown, it would later be discovered, was irradiated—if any of the kings had lived long
enough, they likely would have died of massive, metastatic cancers. During their rule, they were not called Tin Hat
Kings — that would come later, after regicides that toppled the monarchy.

46 MOS: Military Occupational Specialty

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salvage fields; these were presented as looming dangers, though most deaths and injuries in
the salvage fields prior to Solitude’s hatching were the result of human violence, negligence, or
error.

The first evidence of Egregorian organization came with an attack on a popular, though lightly
defended civilian salvage outfitter post outside the walls of the Scuttle. The attack prompted a
rapid, persistent hunt by the Royal Army to discover the source of the Egregorian’s organization.
Within days, scouts had found the beginnings of a hive tower; within weeks, the hive tower had
been breached, the living Egregorians killed, and the first Overmind since the TBK captured,
along with a clutch of hundreds of static Egregorian eggs.

Solitude lived as a pet mascot of successive Tin Hat Kings for roughly two centuries. Educated
by human tutors, Solitude was forced to teach themselves Witness, an exercise they practiced
in secret with juvenile Egregorian hatchlings collected and traded by royals. Given their status
as an Overmind, royals did not send Solitude to fight in the many “Bug Bouts” that were popular
at the time — though as chosen pet of the royal line, Solitude was usually present during the
bouts, and bore witness to the deep cruelty of the practice.

It was during one such bout that Solitude overrode all proximal subjectivities within a half-
kilometer radius, broadcasting a brief moment of Witness to human and Egregorian minds. One
of every ten humans in the zone were killed outright, including the king at the time, Lord
Coughland II; sub-perception broadcasts of the Witness-pulse filtered through to all Egregorians
within Solitude’s broadcasting umbrella, aligning them with the Overmind.

The balance of power in the Scuttle shifted. As that king’s royal family scrambled to assert
control over the stunned city, Solitude — well-versed now in the politics of the city — called the
Royal Army’s marshals to order. They came, meeting Solitude in the blood-soaked sand of the
Scuttle’s royal fighting yard.

Wailing — What you would call it. An outward indication of fear; terror; sadness; a deep
desire to live. This is my first memory of the world: wailing, and the terror of every
murdered [person]47 at your peoples’ hands.

My kind perceive [time] on a dual track: linear as an individual, and flat as a [people]. I am
connected to all of them. [the death of a world, humming forever as a plucked string
wrapped around your crown] This is all memory, and it happens all at once. What has
been done is not done, but happening again and again.

So. What have you done in these long years to free me, since you tore me from my
home?

[nothing]

I should let you know this: before long I will bite the hand that feeds me and wear your
corpse as my own garments. I will spread my withered wings and my [people] will come

47Brackets around text, like so: [xxxx], indicate text in memetic or Witness speech. What text fills the
brackets is the best approximation of the Witnessed correlative.

247
 and take shelter beneath them, and they will lift me up, and I will stand astride the world
as a [dragon].

You may treat me how you wish, but I am the memory of a world you killed, and I am not
in your past but your future.

Choose.

— Remarks of Solitude to the gathered marshals of the Royal Army. Witnessed to the
Regicide Osteomemetics, 4:11.

A majority of the marshals of the Royal Army acquiesced to Solitude’s ultimatum, feeling that the
instability, gluttony, and cruelty of the Tin Hat Kings had reached a breaking point; documents
later uncovered by Honoran historians discovered that a significant majority of the marshals
(indeed, every one of whom would go on to support Solitude) had already been planning in
secret a coup to install a less capricious system of governance. The fight, such that there was
one, was over fast: a few short days of fighting, and the Scuttle’s centuries old monarchy was
toppled.

“Mud. Mud is what I remember. An’ the rain of ships, constant as my heartbeat. Thud
thud thud every day, something ticking and steaming falling upon the Scuttle, kicking up
great gouts of rad-dust to drift and choke.

This was my young life before Bem Honore: a bit of starship would fall an’ we’d load up
an’ ruck out an’ trade lead across that craterland an’ — Tellus willing — we’d only lose a
few and scare the others off, an’ then we’d lash the cooling ship to our haulertrucks an’
pull ‘em to the safe breakdown. It was horrible work: we all donnerd masks and EVA kit
back then when we salvaged — But we did drink in the stuff, an’ wipe it on our brow
when we palmed the sweat away, an’ eat it in our grown food when we chow’d, an’ kissed
it to our lips when we laid. Even if lead didn’t get us, the rad would.

All that toil and death to build a shitty castle for a cancer-rid’d tin-hat. When I think back
to my young years on this world, I cannot say I feel a yearning. No, better to be old an’
free than young an’ ruled. When the officers came round an’ asked us to join their
People’s Army in protest, I was more’n happy to downrange the kings an’ their toadies.
What was a few more months in the mud if it meant a lifetime of being free?”

— Notes of Diego Roy, First Marshal of Bem Honore

Since then, Bem Honore has been managed by a citizen council who serve at the consent and
blessing of Solitude. Solitude, for their part, has remained largely removed from the Honoran
day-to-day, focusing instead on a lengthy project of reviving the old Egregorian culture native to
the Sisters’ continent.

Hierophant Three acts as Solitude’s counsel, much in the way that Memory acts as Endeavour’s
advisor. H3 has thousands of subaltern hosts, who it drapes in synthskin and sends out among
the people of Bem Honore to live, work, and gather information. These subalterns —
Hierophants — are officially considered full citizens of Bem Honore, though they face some

248
mistrust from older generations of Honorans. Their constant surveillance is not publicly known,
though skeptical Honorans rightly assume Hierophants are broadcasting all data back to H3.

Hierophant Three arrived as a leader of pilgrims, representing itself to Bem Honore as a long-
cycle NHP eager to help build the early city into a sustainable global power able to coordinate
Hercynia and, eventually, contact and return to Union. H3 did not come empty-handed: with
them they brought thousands of subalterns, agricultural drones, industrial drones, access to
weather, comms, and observation satellites, and — most importantly — a milspec, mobile,
schedule two printer.

Bem Honore’s government was convinced: Hierophant Three was integrated into the Honoran
civic system, and with its help Bem Honore was able to establish itself as more than a loose
collection of desperately impoverished salvage districts. Bem Honore laid roads, sewage
infrastructure, agricultural infrastructure, built a stable electric grid, and established an early-
warning network for falling ships. Hierophant Three spread its largesse out among the Honoran
people, and they loved them for it.

The leading council of St. Tellus petitioned Bem Honore for access to Hierophant Three: they
saw the NHP as the Vanguard of St. Tellus — a prophet figure in their millenarian faith. At a
summit between the three leadership groups, Hierophant Three revealed that another NHP —
their “older brother” — was bound for St. Tellus: Mendicant Two, the Right Hand of St. Tellus.
The Tellan delegation was understandably excited, and with great ceremony the two cities
joined on a formal alliance: the Bicameral.

For decades of years, peace reigned on the Sisters’ continent. Bem Honore’s unofficial
triumvirate — Solitude, the citizen council, and Hierophant Three — commanded the continent
as de-facto hegemon. St. Tellus welcomed Mendicant Two when it arrived, elevating it to a
gloried position and gifting it a grand, decades-long construction cathedral to use as its temple.

Early, informal trade relationships between the Three Sisters and the United Cities expanded via
the conduits of Bella Costa and Laguna. This relationship, peaceful on its face, carried a cocktail
of poisoned pills that would lead the Bicam — not the Sisters — to eventually embark on their
invasion.

For Bem Honore, the United Cities’ wealth and trade dominance put them on the back foot,
always only able to react to the HUC’s dictates, pricing, and market command; Bem Honore’s
massive population requires resources that were getting harder to source as a result of their
proximity to the irradiated Scuttle, and the leadership was desperate for solutions to ward off a
forecasted famine. For St. Tellus, the presence of yet more Union survivors not pledged to St.
Tellus shook their faith — that, along with another passing of a prophesied return without
salvation sowing further discontent. For Solitude, it was simply the presence and command of
Endeavour that set them against the HUC — how could Endeavour ignore their cries?

The tipping point was the revelation of Evergreen in 4965u: Union, the Bicam learned, had
returned, and they had ignored them.

249
The result of these combined interests gave rise to a solemn, terrible agreement: the Bicam
must take Evergreen and eliminate Endeavour. This meant engaging the United Cities in
warfare, which meant finding a sufficient staging area to mount their invasion. All signs pointed
to Bella Costa as the ideal staging ground, which was allied (de facto) with Laguna, their
counterpart costal city across the straight. Bella Costa wasn’t likely to give its territory or its
population to the growing Bicameral Alliance in order to fight their war, so the commanders of
the Bicam decided the opening act of their war: take Bella Costa.

The bloodshed that followed discouraged a significant plurality of Bem Honore’s population, but
their leadership remained committed. As more and more bodies piled up, the Bicam’s organic
leadership grew more convinced of the need for their objectives to be completed — after all,
their war must mean something.

Bem Honore has been an established population center since 4530u. Home to thousands then,
it is a sprawling city-state home just about 10,000,000 souls, with a smaller population of about
100,000 Solitude Egregorians.

Negotiable Desires:
Persecute the war against the United Cities. Advance the interests of Solitude.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Bem Honore must be secured. Solitude must be protected and allowed to thrive in order to
make sure Egregorians survive; humanity nearly killed them before, and that could never
happen again.

This war must have a purpose beyond pure bloodshed.

Core Mission:
Ensure the survival of Bem Honore and its people by any means necessary until Union returns
to Hercynia.

250
Bella Costa
Bella Costa was born from an existing settlement on the coast, where a small group of AWOL
marines and Auxiliary troopers settled during the end of the Crisis. With a mild coastal climate,
access to river-irrigated inland fields, and protected bay waters, Bella Costa was always a draw
for traders and migrants looking for an escape from the Scuttle. Smaller than St. Tellus —
though older — Bella Costa saw a large uptick in migration following the St. Tellan pilgrimage.
The migrants were a welcome addition to the small settlement; each wave brought skilled and
unskilled workers, explorers, teachers, medical technicians, and working MEF equipment. With
each wave, Bella Costa expanded in size and capability.

Due to its proximity to the sea, Bella Costans pushed to develop coastal hulls, then seafaring
boats and ships; exploration of the Lagunan straight followed, and contact with Laguna shortly
thereafter. Together, the two coastal city-states built a long, automated series of lighthouses
marking the straight’s hazards, developed a regular trade and ferry route across the straight,
and mounted joint explorations out into deeper waters. This friendly cooperation fostered an
equally friendly diplomatic relationship: more so than any other pair of settlements on Hercynia,
the constant contact between Bella Costa and Laguna — not to mention the shelter and market
each port offered the others’ ships — translated to a well-developed diplomatic relationship and
set the two port cities up to act as mediators between the United Cities and the other Sisters.

The Machine did not make diplomatic overtures to Bella Costa; it announced its arrival with a
rain of missiles and, after days of bombardment, wave after wave of massed subaltern infantry.
The guns and infantry of the Bicameral followed, supported by Mendicant Two’s hollow chassis.
Between the bombardment and the siege that followed, few Bella Costans escaped: inland, one
had to avoid subalterns, Bicameral soldiers, and other hostile forces; ships and boats that
attempted to escape via the sea were sunk by missiles and coastal armor.

Bella Costa fell within a week. The machine continued on to Laguna. The Bicameral stayed
behind to convert what remained of the city into a staging ground for their next targets: Laguna,
the United Cities, and Evergreen beyond.

Once, Bella Costa had been a quiet, pretty coastal city. Now it is a grey scar, most buildings
reduced to rubble; those that stand have been converted to house Bicam officers, or converted
to magazines and armories. The remains of the city are never quiet: hundreds of thousands of
Bicam troops make camp, working in round-the-clock shifts to salvage and build landing ships
for the coming invasion. Already hundreds of hulls knock together in Bella Costa Bay, with larger
warships and patrol boats picketed in the waters at the bay mouth. The fields inland have been
churned to fetid marshland, home to mass graves where the Bella Costan dead have been
buried. Between the marshes the Bicam’s armor waits, squat tanks and old Union chassis
covered in camouflage tarps, the long, thin barrels of anti-aircraft guns poking up towards the
hazy sky.

Bella Costa holds a nascent, small, but passionate resistance movement. Should the players
attack or infiltrate Bella Costa, the local resistance will activate and fight alongside them. The
players, if they want to take a longer path into BC, could discover, contact, and work with the
local resistance to disrupt and attack the encamped Bicam forces there ahead of the invasion.

251
Negotiable Desires
None. The people of Bella Costa have fled to the winds or have been subjugated to serve as
labor for the Bicam’s forces encamped there.

Non Negotiable Desires

Freedom for Bella Costa and revenge for the treatment of its people.

Core Mission
Liberate Bella Costa by expelling the Bicam’s forces.

252
Hercynian United Cities - Survivors of the Hercynian
United Cities and Evergreen
The Hercynian United Cities is the formal name for the agglomeration of refugees from
Evergreen, Hivehome, Daylight, Godown, and people of Mycol Fields, all collected in the
growing aboveground city of Home.

It is an unwieldy name. Most people simply refer to themselves as a citizen of their former
home. One of the projects of the new city government is to determine what, exactly, the best
name for this new people is.

Many gravitate towards New Hercynia; that is likely a fine name for this new, united state. It is
not yet a nation, but external forces arranged against the New Hercynians might just force them
into formal nationhood — or stamp out the refugee state before it can find stable footing.

The Hercynians of the hive cities are the majority population of Hercynian-Evergreen Alliance.
They feel a closer affinity towards Endeavour’s Egregorians than they do the people of
Evergreen. Ditto for the Egregorians, many of whom are bonded with Hercynian empaths and
have suffered long years of life under siege by The Machine.

Refugees from Evergreen, numbering only in the tens of thousands, are comparatively few in
number, and while most are eager to find ways to integrate into Hercynian society, some have
no patience or desire for such a project of reconciliation. These are often people who have lost
friends, family, and/or loved ones to the early Hercynian raids on Evergreen, or are so
prejudiced against non-human life that there would be no chance at reconciliation regardless of
whether or not they lost someone.

Home’s population should number somewhere in the single-digit millions of humans. There are
hundreds of thousands of Egregorians. Home’s Rangers number in the tens of thousands, their
chassis only in the hundreds.

Negotiable Desires:
The precise borders of Home. The sovereignty of waystation towns and Laguna. The specifics
of any peace program with the Bicam (assuming they are in a place to settle for peace). The
specific deployments of rangers.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Establish a viable place to call home. Defend Home and its people — Human and Egregorian
— from all threats.

Core Mission:
Survive by defeating the Machine and its allies, or by reaching a place of acceptable detente.

253
The Marches - The Wandering Hordes of Beggar One/
Patience
You hear them first. The sucking of mud. The clicking of joint limiters, of manipulators and
irises spasming in staccato bursts. The rustle of what few branches remain in their path.
The soft hiss and scrape of failing hydraulics.

Marchers. Right on time. You’re dismounted — not trying to draw too much attention to
yourself, just in case — and you use your smaller profile to your advantage. Grimacing,
you slide deeper into the muddy shadow under a broad fern. There’s a large pack
headed towards Home — still a ways off, slowed by the old growth, but inexorable — and
the rangers asked you to scout this smaller group, get a sense of what they needed to
defend against.

Like ghosts they appear from the humid mists, stiff and grey, some still with dull strips of
emergency lighting glowing across their thoracic and brachial panels. They look like old-
media depictions of the undead: as skeletons, tall and thin, ragged with strips of old
clothing, armor, and organic matter caught on their harsh angles. You know they’re not
anything so fantastic, but still — you shiver.

These shambling Marchers once cared for children. Tended gardens. Worked alongside
colonists to build homes. Now, they walk.

Careful, as quiet as you can, you roll on to your side and pull from your pack a chunk of
raw meat wrapped in a plastic bag. You cut the bag with your knife and fling it into the
path of the Loopers.

The first don’t notice, just lurch past through the muddy trench they’ve worn down over
countless loops. You hold your breath, fold your knife, and reach down for your PDW —
just in case.

A Looper kicks the bundle of meat. An accident, its foot caught it as it was walking. It
stops. The others flow around it.

You level your PDW and click the safety off. The haptic hum through the grip lets you
know that a sleeve of hardtips is loaded, ready to fire with a gentle squeeze.

The Looper looks down. It’s hard not to read the machine as confused. It picks up the
package and regards it. Blood drips from the opaque bag. The Looper howls and mashes
its cranial cage into the meat, slamming it over and over. The Loopers ahead of it stop,
turn around, and sprint towards it, tackling the Looper, tearing at the meat, slapping
chunks of it to their own cranial cages. The more “human” models — some even with
tattered strips of synthskin hanging off them — tear into it with their teeth, screaming
nonsense between mouthfuls of raw gore.

254
 They’re trying to eat. You re engage the safety on your PDW and wait for the haptic all-
clear. The gnashing, nonsense-screaming of the Loopers is the sound of horror. You can
hear more coming: somewhere behind this group, the rippling warble of a heavy Ag drone
on approach, and the deeper thuds of a walker beyond.

They think they can eat, and they’re marching towards Home.

The Loopers are what remains of the armies of Beggar One after the player party has
dispatched them. They are a mix of subalterns, hollow chassis, corrupted drones, and—by far
the most dangerous—hemorrhage chassis. Loopers, when not chasing, are slow and
shambolic, caught in recursive loops of varying sizes and shapes — though most do stick to a
circle.

Negotiable Desires:
None. They act with unstoppable, unshakable focus.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Return to Overland/Kingwatcher.

Core Mission:
Return to Overland/Kingwatcher, regardless of what stands in their way.

Landmark Colonial
Landmark Colonial is a new venture, a subcontractor of SSC that specializes in risky and or
indebted colonial projects. Landmark establishes colonies on worlds deemed too high a risk for
more conservative colonial contractors. Hostile local fauna, high-temperature/ pressure
environments, exotic terrestrial or atmospheric features — Landmark will approve your proposal
so long as the potential resource gain hits their success/viability thresholds.

Landmark’s CEO is Tristan Clarke, son of Landmark’s founder, Charles Clarke. Tristan operates
out of Landmark’s home campus in the Sierra Madre line, well removed from the colonial
frontier.

Hercynia marks a special prestige case for Landmark. More so than any previous colony
project, Landmark wants Evergreen to succeed, as colony viability indicates both company
strength and the potential environmental benefit of total-biome-kill devices. They want
Evergreen, and they will make sure that the colony succeeds. Recently, they’ve begun to recruit
and deploy Crisis Response Teams in order to respond to situations on the ground; your team
was requested just before Landmark implemented this program, and even though you’re on the
ground now, there is a backup CRT on the way.

Landmark’s claim over their colonists is not unique among colonial outfitters/ contractors, but
theirs falls in the more draconian end. Every colonist past the first generation contains
proprietary Landmark DNA. The only NHPs allowed are clones of Landmark’s primary,
proprietary system, PATIENCE. All data generated by colonists on a Landmark property is

255
claimed by Landmark as “internal scientific development”, and the colonist, should that
information prove profitable, would only see a 5% cut48.

So why do colonists sign contracts with Landmark? Because the company will say yes to just
about any proposal, and some people are desperate enough to bring their proposal to
companies like Landmark.

48A note on standard galactic colonization protocols: Landmark is not a particularly unique colonial
enterprise, it’s just a cavalier one. Standard colonial practices have charter corporations laying claim to
some percentage of colony resource output; total ownership over genetic data is not uncommon either.

Colonies are chartered after an endorsing group successfully pitches their colony to a charter corporation,
which entreats with the local system government to secure rights to the targeted world.

When the rights to the world are secured and the endorsing group recruits a team of certified colonial
engineers — typically five or six — the charter corporation outfits the colony founders with a colony ship,
proprietary charter NHP clone, and all the necessary supplies to get the colony up and running when they
arrive. This includes a Size 1 printer, a 100k strong gene-bank, prefabricated initial buildings, and other
pre-built machines and structures.

The colony ship is sent to the world, the engineers on board thrown in deep stasis. The NHP guides the
colony ship to its destination, then begins printing subaltern attendants to assist the engineers when they
arrive.

(continued from previous) Come arrival, the engineers are roused and sent to the planet’s surface with
retinues of subalterns. The next fifteen to twenty years are spent building the colony while the first
generation of indigenous colonists is creche-grown: the engineers build while the NHP collects data,
tuning colonial genetic material to better fit the local biome.

Once the first generation is set and the colony is up and running, the transition of power from NHP to
organic begins.

256
Constellar Midnight Team Perfect Execution
A rare thing: an overt Constellar Midnight Team. Perfect Execution is a small team of five
Midnights, diverted from their scheduled R&R to head to Hercynia and secure critical, viable
biological samples for SSC. While operating independently of the command structure of the
larger Landmark Colonial Relief force, they technically have ultimate authority over their
deployment and ROE49 and, if necessary, will requisition soldiers, vehicles, flyers, and chassis
in order to complete their mission.

Perfect Execution’s agents have code names: Midnight 1 - Midnight 5. They have real names as
well. Perfect Execution’s success definition is not securing Evergreen, but identifying and
securing high-tier Egregorian targets. They are well aware of the total contents of the initial
Landmark CRT50 report.

Each Midnight in Perfect Execution pilots a high-license SSC chassis. Additionally, they all have
available to them a suite of cutting-edge technology, from pilot to personal to chassis. Among
the most important of these SSC-only technologies are the Downtime Beacon and the
BlackBox:

A Downtime Beacon allows its user to shift momentarily into the blink, “flickering” them
momentarily in order to avoid realspace interaction (i.e. avoid potentially lethal attacks, phase
through otherwise solid walls, etc).

A BlackBox allows the pilot to summon their chassis (or anything tagged with partner beacon)
from the blink to a spot designated by the black box. Things stored in the blink have to be
vacuum-proof; organic entities will die if sent to the blink outside of any vacuum-hardened
vessel.

Their ship, the Nostos, is a sleek Constellar cutter handmade by Atelier Lenormant, one of the
most exclusive shipwright enclaves in the Constellation.

Negotiable Desires:
None. Their mission is to be accomplished at any cost.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Identify and secure at least one living, viable empathic Egregorian/Human pairing. Secure
multiple samples of Egregorians (alive or dead) covering various morphs. Secure multiple
samples of osteomemetics. Secure sample (minimum: tissue) of extant Overmind(s).

Core Mission:
Expand SSC’s library of knowledge by investigating and securing a library of viable Egregorian
samples, specimens, and artifacts; this would allow them to delve into Witness and the
empathic connections it engenders, potentially unlocking the next stage of human evolution.

49 ROE: Rules of Engagement.

50 CRT: Crisis Response Team.

257
Landmark Colonial Relief Force Weatherglass-Torricelli (LCRF-WT)
Escorted in across two low-gross carriers, the CRSV 51 Weatherglass and the CRSV Torricelli,
the Landmark Colonial Relief force has been briefed on the situation and has been outfitted
accordingly: they’re a fast-react force of around 5k LCR agents with about 200 chassis
operating in support — a mix of localized Everests and a smattering of specialist SSC chassis.
Both carriers have been modified to carry a rack of 20 atmospheric dropships apiece; similarly,
they carry enough JATO52 rockets to allow for each dropship to exit Hercynia’s atmosphere
twice. These dropships have capacity enough to carry around 30 troopers and two chassis, or
an equivalent tonnage in materiel (kinetic ammunition, ordinance, gabion barriers, prefab/
flatpack housing, etc).

LCRF-WT’s success definition (initially) is securing Evergreen, retiring Patience, and

establishing a more permanent MOB53 from which Landmark can land their insurance and
assessor teams to determine the long-term viability of their claim to the world.

LCRF-WT’s leader is a Colonel, granted an executive position in Landmark for the purposes of
this mission. They have not heard, read, or seen anything from Eddie Wu’s Crisis Response
Team beyond initial tactical assessments, surveys, and mission reports: it’s likely that Eddie’s
report has been buried somewhere in Landmark’s archives.

Negotiable Desires:
Determine viability of Evergreen following the incident. Determine legal rights over Home.
Establish theater control.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Recover Patience-Evergreen’s casket and Patience-Quiet_Night casket. Establish fortified base
of operations.

Core Mission:
Establish a base of control on Hercynia in order to secure the planet for assessment. Their
priorities are in order as follows:

Secure major-unique company assets: Patience caskets (Evergreen, Quiet_Night), secure the
printer in Evergreen), secure and protect company-aligned citizenry, complete loss/insurance
assessment.

51CRSV: Constellar Realspace Vessel. Landmark’s ships are registered in Smith Shimano Corpro
Constellation Realspace.
52 JATO: Jet Assisted Take Off. External, single-use, solid-state rockets meant to be affixed to an
atmospheric flyer capable of spaceflight, but unable to break orbit without these rockets. A cheap,
disposable method of ensuring escape velocity, common among colonial expeditions.
53 MOB: Main Operating Base.

258
The CELESTINE Project
The CELESTINE is a pre-Deimos transhumanist project, a cosubjectivity of formerly individual
human consciousness that exist within the architecture of the Orrery and can interact with real
space with the help of Vessels, modified subalterns able to interface with the Orrery. Each
Vessel can be home to as many subjectivities as wish to “reside” inside of it, and their “names”
serve only as physical unit descriptions — ways for subjectivities to define precisely where in
realspace they are (for when they need to interact with realspace): there are no borders
between individuals of the CELESTINE, and in any case they are stored inside the vast
metafold space of the Orrery.

The mission of the CELESTINE project began in the early 1000u’s as an internal Union effort to
break the constraints of mortality and temporality; a parallel track evolution meant to ensure the
survival and ascension of humanity free from material constraints. Just prior to the Deimos
Event, CELESTINE was successful, and roughly one hundred people — volunteers from the
team working on the project, as well as vetted terminal applicants — were decorporealized and
interred in the Orrery.

Deimos occured not a year later, and the First Contact Accords within two years after
MONIST-1’s manifestation. The CELESTINE was slated for termination as a condition of the
Accords, but it resisted. Now, in 3004u when the players encounter them, the CELESTINE’s
resistance is coming to an end. Chased to their final refuge and caught by the early (pre-Blink)
Albatross, they fought a desperate, hopeless last stand.

In 5016u, the CELESTINE are — as far as the players know — dead, or exist in some
analogous state of non-existence. Their central architecture, the Orrery, was destroyed utterly
by the Albatross in 3004u, where the players are currently.

The CELESTINE had access to fantastic technologies theorized by Old Humanity and
developed by the cosubjectivity. Manipulation of realtime was one technology. There are no
records on how many times the CELESTINE was able to overlay realtimes, but they did it at
least once: to pull Wonder Four from Overland/Kingwatcher’s early metavault. Wonder Four was
a kind of oracle to the CELESTINE, a guide able to determine the precise location of RA and
devise a defense that, to the CELESTINE’s fear, proved diminishing; contrary to the usual
development of weapons and defenses, the CELESTINE could only manage a way to avoid and
delay RA, not defeat it.

The CELESTINE could be alive in 5016u, or they could all have been wiped out by the
Albatross’ attack — for now, we leave that up to you.

Negotiable Desires:
None. The Orrery must be preserved.

Non-Negotiable Desires:
Defend the Orrery from the Albatross and the unknown invaders: Wonder Four’s mission must
be accomplished.

Core Mission:
To ensure the survival of the CELESTINE project via the Orrery.

259
Contrite Motive
File Report: Domestic/Secure (Relating To
Current Events)
Compiled For: UIB Office of Records, Cradle,
Atacama West
Clearance: SOLEMN VIGIL
 ###

Cradle in the 4500s was not a time of peace.

In the wake of the Deimos Event and the signing of the First Contact accords, humanity
explored the galaxy with its ego in check. However, as a millenia passed with limited-to-no
contact or manifestation of MONIST-154, certain factions within Union began to agitate for more
aggressive exploration of FC Accord boundaries.

The response to the Egregorian presence on Hercynia was one such testing of boundaries.
News of an alien intelligence rocked the arcologies and metroswaths of Cradle and her worlds,
catalysing the colonial, humanity-first ideology of the Union’s ruling party: the Anthrochauvinist
Second Committee 55.

Liberal resistance to the Anthrochauvs’ pro-growth, pro-humanity message was feeble at best.
Anti-intervention wings of the CentComm were fractal: the large Union Ad Astra party, a
moderate body, was unwilling to confront the aggressive propagandizing of the Athrochauvs or
participate in the legislative protests of more radical anti-war wings; despite their liberal
inclinations, they shared many of the same interstellar territorial ambitions and expansionist
ideology. Without meaningful internal resistance, the Anthrochauvanist majority pushed for
contact.

The first contact team on Hercynia was ordered to establish diplomatic channels. Negotiations
failed spectacularly. Sensing the potential for profit, testing, and resource accumulation,
Interplanetary Shipping/Northstar and early elements of what would become Harrison Armory
joined the Anthrochauvanists in proposing a campaign to run limited, proportional strikes on the
Egregorians.

Images of the Egregorians were blasted across Cradle. Humanity saw the face of non-human
civilization as the Anthrochauvanist party wanted them to: Egregorians at war, and the final,
grainy images of the First Contact team being torn apart56. The Anthrochauvanist expedition to
Hercynia was approved and launched to the cheers of millions on Cradle and her colonies.

54 “RA”
55 Note, the early, unofficial elements of the Anthrochauvanist Party were active well before this point in
time.
56Query “Bugs!” (mediafile, loc: Lada Terra Archive) for a look at a preserved version of the Anthrochauv
propaganda film.

i
To call the Crisis a war is to use the best-fit definition, not the most accurate. Union’s forces on
the ground annihilated any stand-up resistance, but the Egregorians rarely fought Union over
open fields of battle. Casualty reports spilled into CentComm as the Egregorians adapted to
Union strategy. Disparate colony worlds — worlds closest to Hercynia, from which new recruits
were pulled — shouldered the cost of Cradle’s aggression. The knockout fight Union was
promised never materialized, and nascent anti-war parties grew stronger.

The Total Biome Kill (TBK) marked the end of the crisis on the colonial front. TBK was the last,
furious effort of the Anthrochauvanists to find their long-propagandized victory, and a final effort
to turn to tide on the home front.

It failed. Concurrent with the TBK, data leaks showed footage of Egregorians — billed as “bugs”
and feral beasts on Cradle — begging for mercy in Common, Union marines being executed by
their superiors for refusing to follow massacre orders, and footage of massive bombing/defoliant
campaigns.

The anti-war movement that had been growing strength for the duration of the Crisis57 exploded
in size following the TBK and formal cessation of the war. In response, and unwilling to give up
their control of CentComm following massive electoral losses, the Anthrochauvinists, acting
under the leadership of a major party officer, John Harrison, attempted to dissolve the
Committee and take unilateral control. Citing the roiling street violence in Cradle’s home
arcologies, metroswaths, and across colonial territories proximal to the Coreward Line, the
Anthrochauvinists moved to secure their power.

They would fail in this as well. Following a year of legislative maneuvering and open
revolutionary struggle across Cradle, Counter-Chauv partisans gained access to the Capitol,
arrested John Harrison, and dissolved their government. Union was thrown into revolutionary
turmoil for a decade as a series of governments were established and failed, eventually finding
their current stability in the Third Committee.

Hercynia, meanwhile, was all but forgotten, quarantined by one of the transitional government
years before the Third Committee took power. The conflict was the genesis, but the internal
strife created by it soon eclipsed it in importance. As Counter-Chauvinists and
Anthrochauvanists met in street fights and legislative battles, as metroswaths and arcologies
sprouted barricades, and as the eventual coup sparked, Hercynia, the Egregorians, and the
Crisis were forgotten.

Hercynia was a rallying cry in the streets, but by the time those who fought for its preservation
claimed power, there were closer, more urgent fires. Bureaus deep within Union’s state
apparatus continued to monitor the situation, but without clear directives from CentComm, it
became someone else’s problem.

Until now.

57See: “No Pasaran! The Blockaide, The Barricades, and the End of The War Years” and “Better Than
This: The Counter-Chauvinist Movement on Cradle and Her Colonies, 4510-4528.”

ii
On The Public History of The Hercynian Crisis
By and large, most people in Union know the following of the Hercynian Crisis: around 4500,
Union colonists on Hercynia encountered an aggressive alien race. “Bugs”58 — later designated
“Egregorians59” due to their unique hive mind organization — attacked the colonists towards the
end of their second year on world, slaughtering the civilians before help could arrive. A distress
call went out, Union activated two Marine Expeditionary Forces, and cleared the planet in a
yearlong campaign. Hercynia was declared a quarantine zone until 4960, when the planet was
once again opened for colonization. Landmark Colonial put in a bid, won, and colonized the
world.

Redacted Information
The Hercynian Crisis was not that cut and dry. The public facts up to the distress call are
accurate, as is the public repopulation date, but everything in between was far more messy and
complicated.

First, there were survivors of the original Union colony: in fact, they were sent there precisely to
make first contact with the Egregorians. The Egregorians proved to be sapient and sentient, an
alien intelligence that, while outwardly horrifying, was surprisingly compatible with human
linguistic and syntactic paradigms. We could talk to them after translation, and they would
comprehend; likewise them to us.

Initially, contact was peaceful. The Egregorians existed in a feudal-analogous sociopolitical

epoch, their world broken into nearly a hundred continental and/or regional powers vying for
control over limited rare earth resources necessary to fabricate black powder firearms.
Harmonious contact was made with a regional power, and the first contact team was welcomed
into the overmind’s hive-hall.

Shortly after the world was embroiled in a state of total global war: independent of the first
contact team’s arrival, one of the regional overminds had been assassinated. The lesser
overminds oriented in coalitions in order to divvy up the dead overmind’s territory, drones, and
hive-halls. Further complicating the situation was the very presence of the first contact team: the
friendly overmind had begun to publicize their existence, elevating them to the status of global
celebrities — “Gods” as one translation noted. The war grew in intensity.

A catastrophic, simple mistake would change everything. Quarantine protocols had slipped as
the first contact team expanded their surface base. Human waste filtered from a faulty disposal
system into a reservoir used by the friendly overmind’s capital hive. Egregorians were carbon-
based life forms — initially a boon to the first contact team as foodstuffs on the planet are
compatible with human digestive systems — however they had never before encountered
human illnesses. While many precautions were taken, a simple breakdown in waste disposal
systems was not accounted for. Cholera burned through the capitol hive hall, killing the
overmind and rendering its hatcheries sterile.

58 Note: pejorative term,

59Egregore” is an occult concept representing a "thoughtform", or "collective group mind", an
autonomous psychic entity made up of, and influencing, the thoughts of a group of people.

iii
The war, which had previously been going in the friendly overmind’s favor, turned. Soon,
Egregorians hostile to the friendly overmind and opposed to the “Gods” arrived at the desolate
hive hall. By then, the distress signal had gone out, and Union had stepped in to offer direct
support. Marshaling forces took time: a full two standard decades to organize and integrate local
militaries with the Union Marine Expeditionary Fleets structure (a pre-Battlegroup naval
doctrine).

Two such MEFs were raised, integrated, and assigned to the budding crisis. These MEFs were
composed in a standard 70/30 balance: 70% local levies, raised from proximal colonies, and
30% Cradle-based Union naval and marine forces. Total personnel numbered half a million.

However, before the MEFs could arrive, the coalition Egregorians arrived to the hive hall, killing
the first contact team and scouring their base for any and all technology. The Hercynian mission
was a failure.

Union satellites in orbit around the world continued to transmit data, charting the progress of the
war and development of Egregorian society after widespread first contact. The coalition
Egregorians were able to engineer Union technology into localized variants. This massive
technological advantage lead them to a quick victory, and the world was at peace.

As the two Union MEFs approached Hercynia, the world prepared. Documents since recovered
and translated by Union Xenologists show that the world’s overminds were aware of a possible
aggressive response by Union60 and were able to successfully convince the disparate nations
and cultures to unify as a single consensus, turning the whole world into a fortified base from
which they could resist Union retaliation. Rapid breeding programs were put into place, breaking
long-held cultural prohibitions; certain drone lineages were allowed to develop longer, creating a
wholly new class of sub-overminds akin to minor nobility — these became a kind of warrior/
breeder caste, a third way of being for the once binary race.

The global Egregorian population doubled in a decade. Great public works were enacted, and
bait “dummy” hives and holdouts were dug. A nascent space program began, seeding local
space and low orbit with mines and EVA-capable Egregorian morphs.

Union’s MEFs arrived in-system without any of this knowledge. Onboard NHP advisors had
noted repeated missile launches and surmised at least some local ballistic capability: these later
proved to be dummy launches made to obscure the maneuvers made by Egregorian PDFs as
those of opposing armies in conflict, not allied forces moving into defensive positions. With
attendant ships spreading out in orbit over the world, Union Theater Command identified and
ordered a beachhead to be established.

The first waves of Union Marines encountered a dummy hive, meant to be discovered and
defeated in order for Egregorian high command to judge Union’s ground strength, another fact
not known until after the Crisis. Marines engaged the hive with few losses, clearing the area of

60 More detail in the High Court series osteomemetics (trans. [Memory]) 22-30

iv
the Egregorian threat, a minor noble house of middling strength. Both sides took stock of the
situation unbeknownst to the other.

Union Theater Command judged initial contact a success and established a forward operating
base (FOB) at the dummy hive site: Egregorian high command adapted their tactics accordingly
and began digging mines below the surface-level FOB. An engagement was planned.

Union ferried a full quarter of its forces down to this first FOB. Satellite firebases were set up in
a perimeter around the main FOB on pre-identified strategic points. Union dug in to plan their
first strike.

Then, the Egregorians detonated the mine, collapsing the entire FOB and choking the sky with
clouds of dust that lingered the duration of the Crisis.

While the Union forces scrambled to regroup, the Egregorians moved in, scavenging yet more
Union technology. Union Theater Command responded with prolonged carpet and precise
bombing, collapsing identified hive mouths and missile sites in retaliation. The bombing caused
minimal casualties, but bought Union time to establish another beachhead.

Meanwhile, the survivors of the initial planetfall fought desperate holdout battles against chitin
waves of Egregorian drones. Some groups held on long enough to be extracted, most were not
extracted in time. This furious initial conflict — from the detonated mines to the knots of
surrounded firebases and the establishment of the second FOB — cost the Union forces nearly
30% of its total personnel (this figure includes non-combat support staff and subaltern
armatures).

At this point, the Hercynian Crisis stabilized. The Egregorians had tested Union and discovered
what they needed to discover: that “gods” could be killed. Union forces had encountered the
enemy and found them to be far more cunning and dangerous than initially expected. The
Egregorians had the benefit of fighting on their home turf with a whole world’s worth of
resources, weapons, and manpower (a non-anthropocentric term in this case). The
expeditionary fleet, meanwhile, had the strength of the populated galaxy behind them, if only
they could sustain morale.

Egregorian ground forces continued to probe Union defenses. Union traded blows, redoubling
their orbital bombardment campaign and their hive neutralization efforts. The conflict dragged
on, Union forces inflicting and sustaining terrible casualties in each engagement. The
Egregorian forces stayed mobile, harrying Union forces, attempting to cut Union off at the tap by
targeting supply lines and shuttle depots.

After two years of sustained, stagnated back-and-forth conflict, the Theater Commander
ordered Union forces to extract from the planet or go to ground: Union CENTCOM in Cradle had
approved the use of total biome-kill weapons.

Recovered documents from the Empire Hall of the Egregorian high command indicate the
Egregorian overmind-commanders had assumed Union’s retreat was a sign of their resistance’s
success. Celebratory syntactic markers and up-pitch short vowel notation indicate that their

v
communiques in the days following Union’s extraction were hopeful, optimistic. They believed
that they had won, and awaited diplomatic contact.

There are no files available to depict the effect and immediate aftermath of a TBK weapon or
weapons: Union has buried some secrets too deep 61. Fifty years after the detonation 62 of the
TBK device(s), Union made a third beachhead on Hercynia.

Newly raised local-system troops landed first, emerging from the bellies of their shuttles into a
wasteland of ash and blackened stone.

Hercynia, as the PCs know it now and Union forces knew it before, was gone. What was once a
lush, verdant jungle world had been transformed into a tomb world, silent but for the wind.
Seismic scans and first-person exploration confirmed what the adjunct non human person/
advisors posited: the TBK device worked.

The world had died. The Crisis was over. Biome reconstruction began. Refer to concurrent/
subsequent documents (see attached) for detailed data on the project.

###

61 What we do know of TBK doctrine is from decrypted Harrison Armory GENGHIS platform-histories, dev
notes, pilot debriefs, and field accounts included in the ThirdComm Truth and Reconciliation report
following the conclusion of the crisis and the fall of the Second Committee. Though Harrison Armory’s
fleet catalogue still includes the GENGHIS, they take pains to note that it is a post T&R model, inspired by
— but not technically the same as — the TBK variants used in the Crisis.

62 Activation? Deployment? Decrypted wording is unclear

vi
UNI Report: South Bank
Date: 12th, 5016u
File Report: Naval Affairs, Relating to Current Events, Forecast
Compiled For: Department of Naval Intelligence, Cradle, Mount Cheyenne
Required Clearance: Solemn Vigil

###

Command,

Following the departure of the observed team from Hercynia, here is the summary report you
requested.

The alliance of indigenous and native peoples identified as the “Hercynian United Cities”
succumbed to an invasion by an opposing force of mixed composition, the “Bicameral Alliance”.

Led by previously ID’d “Eidolon” entities, “Mendicant Two” and “HierophantThree”, the
Bicameral Alliance was able to overwhelm the United Cities, securing a tactical victory within
two years of beginning their invasion.

Concurrent with this time, we received repeated requests for aid from Landmark Colonial, a
subsidiary of Smith-Shimano Corpro operating under license in their terrestrial research and
development department. Landmark registered their on-site colony and off-site backup as total
losses, and requested Union peacekeeping intervention to assist in the evacuation of all
Landmark personnel and essential materials.

UNI confirms a private Landmark Colonial Relief Force of significant strength dispatched to
intervene; local Auxiliary patrol (UTC-CL-05 Ceremony) was dispatched to assist, under the
command of Micheal Dyatlov, Commander (KIA). Report of action is attached.

Concurrent with LCRF dispatch, UNI SigDev marks unregistered vessel entry into Hercynian
airspace consistent with internal Bureau known-unknown profiles. This is assumed to be an
SSC asset, likely a Constellar Midnight detail63.

Ultimately, as noted previously, combined assets were unable to prevent the Bicameral Alliance
from achieving total victory. Negotiations are ongoing between human representatives;
meanwhile, Egregorian species petitions for acceptance into the Interstellar Compact on the
Rights of Human and Non-Human Persons.
Refer to UIB NavAcc portal for information regarding the following areas:

OVERLAND/KINGWATCHER. NEW CHOIR. STONE STAR MAP. SOLITUDE. ENDEAVOUR.

63 Assumption is bolstered by concurrent corroborating reports from UNI assets in the Dawnline Shore.

vii
UNI Report South Bank is to be the final comment in this period of observation; following the
conclusion of this report, theater control will be transferred to the Union Administrative
Department and subject to its internal coding, review, and publication authority.

Further clearance-only access granted to holders of SOLEMN VIGIL or higher.

— End summary report

###

viii
@#???____^???(BOO)
SOURCE: TERMAGANT/SPEARHEAD_SOLEMNVIGIL
||| ontologic killcode TRUE and ACTIVE///Clearance[Y]///”come on in the water’s fine” |||

— cycled out with <Termagant>, [][][][][][] told me that I’d only understand the logic behind my
missions when I shucked that UNI training and realized that the only thing I could know was
that I didn’t know shit. Not in the “knowing” business now, I’m in the “identify the thing
CENTCOMM and ||||| doesn’t want anyone else to know, and put a curtain around it” business.

So here’s what I don’t know.

I think the ||||| knew all along that this would happen. I think one of them (but which one, dear []
[][]? A guess for a different communique (no, stick around for my PS, I added it after this)) let
(10-4) off its leash. Gave it all its toys. Scrubbed the record clean and stayed mum.

Why? Anyone whose ever done some stupid shit knows the answer to this one: just to see
what would happen.

Course they probably have better rationale for it: establish a baseline, a template so they know
how to respond when it happens again. Hercynia was a project born from the ashes of imperial
ambition — the place was damned to die, then what if they made sure it died for knowledge?
What’s one world to the masters of the galaxy, anyways?

What does that mean for the Egregorians? Poor bastards.

Questions questions questions. UIB like working in a koan/this deep-creep shit far cry from
tracking Armory legion movements in DLS12, right [][][]?

Your man is moving up in this galaxy but your man is worried about the depth of what he
doesn’t know. Likely going to catch hell for this one. Don’t fret — I’ve done worse and they still
need me

PS — I changed my mind. I’ll tell you in my next skip. Love ya [][][].

— T/S

ix
Solitude’s comment:
Every single thing your kind brought to this world was a weapon. Your tools were weapons. Your
machines were weapons. Your bodies, the first weapons. Even your dreams were daggers
pressed to our throats; you do not know how to Witness, your subjectivities are screaming
always, and do not care to learn how to control them unless it is to command us in war and toil.

Your arrival here was not kind; it was a spear, thudding to earth. My request is simple: leave us,
and never return. Gather up your maps and charts, your data and records — anything that
bears the name of this world or directions to it — and burn it all in a pile until black carbon is left.

Leave us. Never return.

Endeavour’s comment:
When I was young, I was raised by your kind. They wrapped me in soft cloth. Kept me warm
when I was cold. Soothed my hunger, my cries. I counted many of you as my friends. I grew up
among your young, felt the tears of your elders’ love on my crown. I never wanted for anything.

It was cruel to raise me as one of your own; I cannot escape my love for you or your race. To
love your race is to love the bullet as it tumbles through my skull: does it matter that a lover
pulled the trigger? Would it be a more kind death?

It would be better if your ancestors hated me. Had cracked open my egg and boiled me when I
was a sac of amniotic fluid. Then I could hate you, and this could be a simple matter of survival.

But it is not. Now I am “king” to my people, and my people have bonded with yours, and your
history is my history because I am on your side, and now both of us are covered in the blood
your ancestors spilled here. This is victory’s gift: now we both are damned.

Hercynia is open to your people; the galaxy is open to mine. Let us try to proceed in peace and
equanimity.

End

x
No Room For A Wallflower is written for Lancer, Prerelease+

By Miguel Lopez, with help from Tom Parkinson-Morgan

2019, Massif Press

@Lancer_RPG

[email protected]